THE THINGS AMONG THINGS
as coisas entre as coisas
laura erber
Project by Marcela Levi and Flavia Meireles
in collaboration with Laura Erber
Profanation does not just mean abolishing and
canceling separations, but rather learning to use them
differently and play with them.
Giorgio Agamben
Interrupting in order to understand. Understanding in order
to talk. Finally, talking only to interrupt and make impossible
interruption possible.
Maurice Blanchot
The things among things is a project for a choreography duet conceived by
Marcela Levi and Flavia Meireles which proposes to investigate an action that
produces a discourse where the body that moves-thinks-talks vacillates. We
are especially interested in what is produced in the intervals, the gaps from
where the meaning escapes.
Collaborating on a daily, continuous basis for three years, the artists founded a
small nucleus for research and artistic creation that places its trust in the
following outlook:
- There are no pre-defined roles or functions. Each project points to our
respective temporary functions and positions;
- Our research is concerned with movement, but we feel that thought too is
movement, and that movement talks and that talking too is movement;
- The work space (the study and exchanges that take place outside and
beyond the physical space) needs no pre-established methodology to be
inhabited. We believe that empty-handed we can look, hear and probe a
beginning for each day of work;
- We are not interested in a body that is just trained but rather in a body
that is present, reactive, relational and transitory. A foreign body in every
movement-thought-talk produced.
This project sets out with the idea that talking is also movement, which is
thinking, which is movement too, which is also talking.
We place our trust in a plastic, fluid material that we call talking-movingthinking.
We put our bets on a movement-talk-thought that surges from fissure,
deviation, rupture, mistake, discontinuity, interval, stumbling.
Our interest lies in building a choreographic script made of performatic fragments
that create mutual tension without the pretense of a narrative.
The body that thinks-moves-talks like a field of interrogations both for the
performer and the spectator.
The non-pacified, incomplete and transitory meaning, the things that emerge
among things, these are the question that guide this work-encounter. In it we
propose to delve into doubts, provoke flights and deviations of meaning, while
inviting the spectator to take part in the performatic gesture as a process of resemantics.
THE THINGS AMONG THINGS
Artistic direction: Marcela Levi
Conception, creation and interpretation: Flavia Meireles and Marcela Levi
Dramaturgic collaboration and co-creation: Laura Erber
Lights: José Geraldo Furtado
Photography: Claudia Garcia
Musical consultant: Bruno Rezende
Graphic design: Paula Delecave
DIRECTION, CONCEPTION, CREATION AND INTERPRETATION
Marcela Levi (1973, Rio de Janeiro) is a performer and choreographer. A
graduate of the Angel Vianna Dance School, she was a member of the Lia
Rodrigues Dance Company for eight years. In 2002 she began to develop solo
projects uniting contemporary dance and the visual arts. Her work has been
presented at various festivals in Brazil, Spain, France, Belgium, Austria, the
United Kingdom, Germany and Portugal. Parallel to this, she collaborates with
choreographers Vera Mantero, Dani Lima, Cristina Moura and Gustavo Ciríaco
and wih photographers Claudia Garcia and Manuel Vason. In 2006 she was
awarded a scholarship at the Les Recolléts exchange center in France, and the
Klauss Vianna Dance Prize sponsored by Petrobras. In 2007, along with visual
artist Laura Erber, she received the Batiscafo-Triangle Arts residence scholarship
for Havana (Cuba) and was awarded the Itaú Cultural Dance Rumos Program. In
2008 she was invited, together with Flavia Meireles, to take part in the Artists in
Residence La Casa Encendida Program at the Alcalá de Henares University in
Madrid.
CONCEPTION, CREATION AND INTERPRETATION
Flavia Meireles (1978, Rio de Janeiro) is a performer and qualified dance
teacher from the Angel Vianna Faculty. She has collaborated in projects with
artists João Saldanha, Marcela Levi, Gustavo Ciríaco and Paulo Caldas. She is a
member of the collective CORPO REAGENTE which gathers together artists
from dance, visual arts and cinema. She took part in the spectacles ExtraCorpo,
Soma and Afirmações Intencionais: Acidentes by João Saldanha, and In-organic
by Marcela Levi. She directed and choreographed Três Desejos Tão
Deseperados and chance meeting, the latter in partnership with Micheline
Torres. In 2008 she was invited, together with Marcela Levi, to participate in the
Artists in Residence La Casa Encendida Program at the Alcalá de Henares
University in Madrid. She teaches History of Dance at the Angel Vianna School.
DRAMATURGIC COLLABORATION AND CO-CREATION
Laura Erber (1979, Rio de Janeiro) is a writer and visual artist. She was resident
artist at Le Frosney Contemporary Art Center in France and at the Akademie
Schloss Solitude in Germany. Her works are exhibited in various international
cinema and video festivals, besides art centers in Brazil and Europe (Le Plateau,
Jeu de Paume, the European House of Photography in France, the Museum of
Contemporary Art in Moscow, the Museum of Modern Art in Paris, the Museum
of Modern Art in Rio de Janeiro, Oi Futuro, Largo das Artes, among others). She
has held solo exhibits at the Miró Foundation in Barcelona and at the
International Art Center at Vassivière Island in France. In 2006 she was awarded
scholarship from the Les Recolléts exchange center in France. In 2007, together
with performer Marcela Levi, she received the Batiscafo -Triangle Arts residence
scholarships in Havana (Cuba). She was resident writer at the Pen Center in
Antwerp and has published the collection of poetry Insones (7 Letras, 2002),
Körper und tage (Merz-Solitude, 2006), Vazados & molambos (Design editora,
2008) and e Os corpos e os dias (Bodies and day) (Editora de Cultura, 2008).
CONTACTS
Marcela Levi
marcelalevi@hotmail.com
http://marcelalevi.wordpress.com
Skype id: marcelalevi
Tel: +55 21 3079 3778
Cel: +55 21 8122 8965
Flavia Meireles
flaviameireles@hotmail.com