NO*21
from the series dances that nobody wanted to name
...
All performances presented by the Arka Dance Theatre have something in
common - the analysis and researching on relations between movements
and sounds, which often lead to many amusing interactions and
interconnected events. The plays usually develop into shows/concerts
full of absurd and grotesque, where everything ispossible. That is why
NO*21 is such a surprise for the audience -
significantly more ascetic and mellow...
Julia Hoczyk
ARKA DANCE THEATRE
was
set up in 1999, started with a performance"Miedzy nami czlowiekami"
presented in The Capitol Musical Theatre in Wroclaw. Dance Theatre Arka
in Wroclaw results from Jacek Gebura and a group of people seeking for
a kind of theatre where the leading means of
expression is movement.
The
main characters of the presentation are: movement and its quality,
rhythm, the articulation and dynamism of the dancer's movement,
creating the space and the awareness of being in it. The harmonic
coexistence of the aforementioned qualities describes the actor/dancer,
constructs the character, which is the result of "here and now",
determines the relations among the performers. ARKA tries to smile at
the human imperfections, however showing a man in positive colors.
A
significant thing for ARKA is searching for proper matter and means, in
order to communicate with the audience, but the ensemble does not avoid
the intended absurd and abstraction. The shows are
based
on juggling the means from the set realizing the construction.
Awareness, movement, space, body - these are the basic definitions of
the essential assumptions of ARKA dance experiences. Using
achievements of Rudolf Laban, John Cage, Merce Cunningham - we are searching for our own means in the relations: dance-dancer, dancer-theatre, psyche-physicality. We are building our own theatre where the movement and dance let us express ourselves.
...
One last word to the men from the Arka Dance Theatre as an answer to
the question from their perormance's title "For whom a song - a
movement poem for joints and larynx": it was really worth listening to
such an amusing, vigorously "danced" (so that you feel the pain in your
bones, don't you?) absurd song...
CriticalDance
Agnieszka Goławska
...
Some significant festival performances were "less pure-dancing"works,
being more movement shows and theatre plays. Most of all Arka Dance
Theatre with their Dances that nobody wanted to name (choreography by
Jacek Gebura, performance awarded for "researching on enriching their
own theatre language"). Three different dancers, three artists, three
personalities. Three wooden windows, three doors, figures standing in
the point light. The beginning that appears to be very ascetic at first
glance is being developed into a humorous story with an interesting
plot, full of strange situations with dancers interacting with each
other and
different
objects emerging all the time. A very important role is played by the
artitists' breaths and voices creating the performance
background
and the pace of the fable. There are parodies of breakdance and
Buddhistic meditations, guttural sounds, elements of opera singing.The
requisites that seem not to suit the action (bags, a ball, a fly-flap,
a bucket and rag-dolls) appear to be necessary and greatly fulfill the
unconventional dancing. It is worth adding that despite the explicit
irony and grotesque, the performance - full of improvisations - is a
pure entertainment...
Julia Hoczyk
NO*20
A movements for the joints and the larynx
from the series dances that nobody wanted to name
... Performances which concentrate mostly on the form are really hard.
But
a lot depends on the actors of course. I was very amused watching the
NO*2 of Jacek Gebura and Maciek Prusak, I think I even saw a football
game with a whistled foul.The facial expression of the actors helped a
lot. The strong point of the performance was also the permanently
changing plot and music, and one did not know whether there were young
boys or teenagers on the stage...
Anna Jurczyk
NO*2 from the series dialogues for hands and legs
...
The dances were not named, so they do not force us to believe in widely
accepted theories. The three "men in black" with an amazing invention
are seen dancing around the blue bags and their contents. Show me what
you have in your bag and I will tell you who you are - according to
that saying the dancers create individualistic figures of different
characters. The strength of the performance are the auto-irony and
distancing of the dancers from themselves. One can see they feel good
on stage, who knows how much they are actors, and how much dancers...
Looks like the former goes hand in hand with the latter...
Joanna Prycz
...
Arka Dance Theatre creates very particular theatre plays, continually
searching for new formal solutions and methods. The pieces are
experimental and full of the avant-garde contrariness. However it does
not have much in common with the conceptual dancing, what could be
implied by e.g. moving the dominant from the movement into musicality
(like in the current performance of the Arka DanceTheatre). The
performers distance themselves from the continuous narration. While
creating the work they construct loosely coupled scenes, oscillating
between the musicality theme...
Anna Królica
