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against the wall

Some of the most impressive dance images on a stage are Pina Bausch’s walks, runs and falls against a wall. Not only in many of her works all the time dancers were and will be running on stage against walls doing it once, repeating it endless times. Although it is not possible to keep on running against a wall forever the image is saying: I do it again and again. Dancing until collapsing, repeating a movement until it starts dancing by itself. Running against a wall and doing it again is full of contradiction. In the same movement an imprisonment and liberation. Living such a

paradox

in the body is really only possible when the end of a movement is not predictable. This is the reason why the dance marathon Dancing Days opens a space to dancers with almost unlimited time und the most urgent request: not to stop dancing.

After a 24 hours and a half day format the longest Dancing Days lasted in stages for 11 days. All these forms have been developed for groups from 12 to 36 dancers. An actual solo format and new stagings for groups are dealing with the evolution of Dancing Days focusing newly on the performative and creative confrontation next to the mental and physical challenge. In relation to endless dancing the question is: What and who will

I

create when time has no limit? Do I dance with all my contradictions or do I lose them? How is it possible in a situation full of tiredness and exhaustion not to flee confrontation but to trust in ambiguity and to create an authentic movement, to take a risk in spite of the tiredness? Running against walls and taking energy from it. The challenge is to develop lightness within the own physical heaviness without renouncing oneself. A peculiar example for a possibility and a strange outlook is given by an animal. By the way a camel deals with weight, resistance and risk. Because when loading a

camel

with heavy weight instead of standing still it will start walking naturally to relieve its knees and ankles. It moves into its famous amble walk, passing first both legs on one side and then on the other. While one side is carrying even more weight the enigmatic animal develops lightness on the opposite side of the body. That is why a camel walks with a slightly swinging and swaying quality with which the animal enters into the impossibility of the desert.

 

stefan dreher

about the dance marathon project Dancing Days