Everything Burns_traces
MOTUS (Italy)
- Thursday Sep 9 / 20:00, School
World premiere TEATRI DI ROMA 9.9. 2021 – SPECIAL offshoot for 4+4 Days in Motion
Sometimes the need at the base of the artistic work has a lot to do with material impediments or necessities. The video Everything Burns_traces, offshoot of our new work Everything Burns, was born from the impossibility to physically take part in the 4+4 Festival in Prague, which has warmly welcomed us since the beginning… This year we celebrate 30 years of Motus with this contribution, hoping to be able to come back soon to meet the beautiful audience and the Festival staff!
The material impossibility was the starting point to rethink and expand the boundaries of the show, making the camera travel inside the scene and in close proximity with the actresses up to catch their breaths, whispers, the twists of their bodies among the ashes.
After our artistic journey into the figure of Antigone, we have desired for a long time to continue digging down into the female figures of the Tragic, whose echo and impacts are still resonating today.
The research started before the lockdown and now it has unavoidably taken on a new light and urgency.
The pandemic and the climate disaster mark the end of an era and Trojan Women starts precisely with an end. It is an irregular tragedy, a tragedy without plot, conflicts and climax, a conflict has rather exploded but everything is over now, all has already happened: Ilion is already destroyed. The women, reduced to war spoils, wait for the division, they will be leaving by sea soon after, as slaves, towards foreign soil. There is no plot, nor storyline, only a never-ending evoking of the ghosts of the past.
With her words Hecuba buries the dead,
with her words Cassandra ignites the future.
But central are the pain and torment of grief which, outside the personalistic sphere, open a deeply political issue. Which bodies are to be mourned and which are not? How are we allowed to express grief, the pain of loss (or of the separation from one’s own place of origin, as in the case of diasporic communities)?
During the pandemic the functions for the dead were suspended, the bodies were buried in a bureaucratized way, in secret, in silence, without a farewell. The same happens for migrant bodies dead at sea, for illegal migrants or sex workers executed by the trafficking system. Which lives matter, then? What makes a life grief-worthy?
The Motus Theatre company was founded by economics historian Enrico Casagrande and sociologist Daniela Nicolò in 1991. They burst onto the scene in the 1990s with performances that had a great physical and emotional impact, and always foretold and portrayed some of the harshest contradictions of the present day. Motus’ profile is characterized by a number of features: artistic interdisciplinarity, the overcoming of boundaries between the arts and the social sciences, research in the field of new technologies, nomadism, collaboration with artists from diverse cultural backgrounds, inclusion … Together with their theatrical creations, Motus has always developed an intensive program of public meetings, workshops, lectures, and seminars at universities (both in Italy and abroad) as well as at interdisciplinary festivals.
Motus has received many international awards and acknowledgements. The theatre company has received the main Italian UBU theatre prize three times. They have performed around the world, including appearances at important international festivals (Under the Radar in New York, Festival TransAmériques in Montréal, the PuSh Festival in Vancouver, Santiago a Mil in Chile, the Fiba Festival in Buenos Aires, the Adelaide Festival in Australia, and the Taipei Arts Festival in Taiwan).
Idea and direction Daniela Nicolò and Enrico Casagrande
Video by Vladimir Bertozzi
With Silvia Calderoni, Stefania Tansini and R.Y.F. (Francesca Morello) on songs and music
Lyrics Ilenia Caleo and R.Y.F. (Francesca Morello)
Dramaturgical research Ilenia Caleo
Text editing and subtitles Daniela Nicolò
Translations Marta Lovato
Technical direction and lights Simona Gallo
Soundscapes Demetrio Cecchitelli
Live sound design Enrico Casagrande
Sound engineering Martina Ciavatta
Technical assistance Francesco Zanuccoli
Props and scene sculptures _vvxxii
Production Elisa Bartolucci with Francesca Raimondi
Organization and logistics Shaila Chenet
Promotion and communication Marta Lovato with Francesca Lombardi
Press office comunicattive.it
International diffusion Lisa GilardinoProduction Motus and Teatro di Roma – Teatro Nazionale with Kunstencentrum Vooruit vzw (BE)
Supported by the Residency centres: L’arboreto – Teatro Dimora | La Corte Ospitale ::: Centro di Residenza Emilia-Romagna and Santarcangelo dei Teatri
In collaboration with AMAT and Comune di Fabriano
With the support of MiC, Regione Emilia-Romagna
Thanks to HĒI black fashion, Gruppo IVAS
