In today’s reality, caregiving responsibilities still largely fall on women. At the same time, we are immersed in virtual pseudo-truths, opinions and the endless amount of information that reaches us. Many of us live in a state of constant tiredness. In such a context, the simple gesture of pausing, listening to ourselves and following our body and desires can become a political act. Private is political.
From this perspective, Martina Hajdyla Lacová – woman, dancer and mother of three small children – steps on stage. Her now almost forty-year-old body carries many public and private stories. “Second practice”, drawing on thirty years of professional experience and body/dance memories, creates space for her return to what is crucial to her existence – acknowledging her dance & body history, listening to herself in dance and finding pleasure in moving. The show also invites the audience on a journey through glimpses of past and present together with her.
The performance touches the desire of a dancer, a woman and mother, to immerse deeply in herself through a practice that, in the numerous responsibilities, chaos, tiredness and constant distraction of everyday life, has become secondary – the practice of mindful dancing in the here and now.
The solo of Martina Hajdyla Lacová created together with choreographer Renata Piotrowska-Auffret thus opens not only a personal story, but also a wider image of what today’s society lacks, needs or what is being questioned.
Duration: 50 min.
Concept, text: Renata Piotrowska-Auffret /PL/
Choreography: Martina Hajdyla Lacová, Renata Piotrowska-Auffret /PL/
Dance: Martina Hajdyla Lacova
Music & video: Simon Auffret & J.S.Bach
Costume & scenography: Natalie Rajnišová
Visual dramaturgy & light desing: Joanna Leśnierowska /PL/
The performance uses musical quotes from the following works: STING: We’ll Be Together, Jørgen Knudsen – music for the performance Manshape, Ben Frost, album: Aurora, track: Venter, music from the performance VerTe Dance & Zrní: Ceviche, Ábris Gryllus – music from the performance SOFT SPOT, Bach JS, Goldberg variations, BVW: Variation XXX. Quodibet and Aria da capo (performed by Beatrice Rana), ballet Sleeping Beauty, variation Lilac Flower, and Slovak folk song.
Photo: Terezie Fojtová
Production: Adéla Lipavská
Technical support: Sebastián Vích, Ján Čief, Jiří Hajdyla
PR manager: Jolana Danková
Financial manager: Daniela Řeháková
Creative producer: Jiří Hajdyla
Project partners: Hellerau – European Centre for the Arts, Theatre Štúdio Tanca Banská Bystrica, Nová Síť / Art-in-res, 4+4 Days in Motion festival, Co.labs, Venuše ve Švehlovce, Moving Station, Nowy Teatr Warsaw.
The project is supported by the Ministry of Culture of the Czech Republic, the City of Prague, the City of Brno, the State Fund for Culture, the National Recovery Plan, and the European Union.
The artistic platform ME-SA has been active on the independent dance scene since 2008. The current work of the platform is characterized by interdisciplinary collaboration (visual arts, sports, music, virtual reality) and an experimental creative approach that includes research into movement material, visual dramaturgy, conceptual strategies or deconstruction of theatrical practices. In recent years, the platform has focused on feminist themes. The main artistic personality and common denominator of all ME-SA projects is choreographer, dancer, performer Martina Hajdyla Lacová.
Martina Hajdyla Lacová graduated from the Conservatory in Banská Bystrica and completed her Master’s degree in dance pedagogy at the HAMU in Prague, where she is currently studying for her PhD. In her work Martina uses dance as a concept, as a part of communication and interaction, as a natural movement of human bodies. In 2015, she won the Dancer of the Year Award for her performance in SuperNaturals. She was nominated for the 2016 Thalia Award for her performance in the solo show One of the Seven. In 2023 she won the Czech Centres Award for her performance in SOFT SPOT, and in 2024 she won the Thalia Award in the Alternative Theatre category for her performance in Bodies in Progress.
Renata Piotrowska-Auffret is a choreographer and artist who uses experimental dance, performance art, dramaturgy, and theater in her work. She reflects on the contemporary world, drawing inspiration from intimate experiences, both real and fictional, set in a given social context. She is interested in the perversity of the relationships between historical and contemporary politics of the body, between the public and the private, as well as between text and movement. Co-curator of the pilot program in the Pavilion of Dance and Other Performative Art in Warsaw – newly created department of Museum of Modern Art, she is also associated with Adam Mickiewicz Institute, where she works as a choreography expert.
