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Many dancers and choreographers from different parts of the world enjoyed great success in early 20th century Europe. Still, they were forgotten because they did not fit the Western canon nor represented European nation states. Choreographer Amanda Piña breathes new life into their works with her new creation EXÓTICA.


EXÓTICA is an exuberant ritual, conceived as a séance through which ancestors’ dancers, femmes and queer people of color from the past and the present enter in conversation with the gaze of the audience. The live performance is a space of re-enactment, invocation, exorcism and celebration.


La Sarabia (1878-1988), Nyota Inyoka (1896-1971), François (Féral) Benga (1906–1957) Leila Bederkhan (1903-1986) all once travelled through Europe presenting their dances. What kind of work did these dancers and choreographers of color made at the time? How can we understand it today? What is still present of their contexts today?


Amanda Piña: ‘Within this research I would like to get to know my direct ancestors: women and queer fellow artists, dancers and choreographers of color living and working in Europe at the beginning of the 20th Century. To host their reappearance is the vision and intention of this work, an invocation and a spiritual quest on the implications of whiteness, understood as an -invisible for itself- embodied ideology, an unmarked and unnamed position.’

PROGRAMME BOOK

  • Amanda Piña, choreographer

    © Michel-Jimenez

  • © Tammo Walter

  • © Tammo Walter

  • © Tammo Walter

  • © Tammo Walter

  • © Tammo Walter

  • © Tammo Walter

credits

choreography Amanda Piña performing made with and by Ángela Muñoz Martínez, André Bared Kabangu Bakambay, Venuri Perera, iSaAc Espinoza Hidrobo, Amanda Piña dramaturgy Nicole Haitzinger integral design Michiel Jimenez scenography “Forêt Asiatique” (1921) by Albert Dubosq, as part Amanda Piña's contribution to Infini #18 (2022) technical manager Santiago Doljanin music Ángela Muñoz Martínez, Zevra song lyrics Amanda Piña vocals Venuri Perera, Ángela Muñoz Martínez, André Bared Kabangu Bakambay, iSaAc Espinoza Hidrobo, Amanda Piña live music Ángela Muñoz Martínez, and performers sound design Dominik Traun costumes Federico Protto assistant director Pierre-Louis Kerbart production and distribution neon lobster, Giulia Messia, Katharina Wallisch  production Amanda Piña/Fortuna coproduction Kunstenfestivaldesarts, Festival d’Automne à Paris, Holland Festival, Tanzquartier, PACT, Fortuna / Amanda Pina Funding Support, la Bâtie-Festival de Genève, DDD Porto thanks to Stadsschouwburg Kortrijk, Showtex, NTGent workshops, Bruno Forment, FWF funded project Border Dancing Across Time P-31958, Christina Gillinger-Correa Vivar (archival research), Rolando Vázquez (decolonial theory/interview) with the support of deSingel, KWP Kunstenwerkplaats Brussels, wpZimmer

This performance is made possible by