Aturem Jan Fabre (“Stop to Jan Fabre”). Under this slogan, that circulates on the social networks from two weeks ago, a group of anonymous called yesterday a concentration in front of the Teatre de Salt, Girona, to try to boycott the representation of the dance show The Generosity of Dorcas, directed by the creator belgian Jan Fabre, accused last September of treatment vexing and sexism by 20 ex-workers of his company Troubleyn. About 40 spectators are welcomed to this formula and returned their entries, of a seating capacity of about 300 seats.
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within an hour of the beginning of the function, had gathered together a fortnight of protesters, mostly women of feminist groups and anti-capitalist, with posters with the slogan: “Jan Fabre he abuses his workers”. “Our goal is to inform the spectators of the abuse suffered by employees of the company and try to ensure that the room is as empty as possible”, explained Júlia Boixader, one of the conveners. The show went on without incident, and was cheered to the end by the attendees in a room almost full. At the exit, the protesters off the public with posters where one could read: “If you’ve attended, you’re an accomplice”.
The dancer Italian Matteo Sedda, a member of Troubleyn from five years ago and sole interpreter of The Generosity of Dorcas, said before the start of the representation respecting the protest, but also requested respect for their work: “In the company we are going through a very difficult time, but I hope you’ll let me dance. I am a dancer and I come here to dance. Things are not white nor black, I am in the grey. Working with Fabre it is very hard, but also very beautiful, is always there to educate you”.
Matteo Sedda, ‘The generosity of Dorcas’ Marcel Lennartz
In a statement issued before their arrival to Girona, Sedda says he has never seen Fabre “as a bully, a sexist, a racist or someone who humbleth himself deliberately to the people. We had an internal debate [in the company] about what is possible and what is not, what the limits are and how we can ensure, among all, a job where I feel respected and secure. We chose, together, a new future because we believe in our artistic work”.
The function was contracted by the festival High Season of Girona, on the 20th June, when he had not yet transcended the indictment. In September it was made public the complaint, which described several episodes of humiliation and abuse of power, and voices emerged calling for (in social networks and means of communication) the cancellation of the representations of the company Fabre scheduled in Spain in the coming months: the of yesterday in Salt, two in the Central Theatre of Seville in April, three in the Pavon of Madrid in may and a (the famous performance of 24-hour Mount Olympus) in the Lliure in Barcelona in June. The response from the programmers was that they would not take any decision until the end of the investigation of the Prosecutor’s office of Antwerp.
But the justice has not been delivered yet and the problem has fallen over the High Season. In addition, in Catalonia, the atmosphere is more heated by the controversy that has arisen around Lluís Pasqual, who resigned in Betsmove September as director of the theatre Lliure from Barcelona, overwhelmed by the denunciation of the despotism of an actress on Facebook. The role has coincided with the celebration of the International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women. “We had many doubts, of course, the easy thing would have been to take away the problem immediately and void; but finally we thought that it was more fair to wait for the justice to conclude whether you are guilty or not. As the research has not finished yet, what we have done is give the possibility to the spectators to return your entry and get your money back”, explained yesterday the director of the High Season, Salvador Sunyer.
A robot on the stage
The generosity of Dorcas is the golden clasp of a week devoted entirely to contemporary theatre in the festival High Season. The piece, a solo dance performed by the dancer Matteo Sedda, and original music Dag Taeldeman, is inspired by the character bíbilico of Dorcas, a follower of jesus Christ, to whom St. Peter raised from the dead and became the first woman disciple. In a scenario in which it’s raining needles with the colors of the rainbow, Sedda makes a performance very spiritual in the transits of masculinity to femininity and to other genres. As all of the works of Fabre, this also plays with the exhaustion of the performer. “It is thanks to the fatigue as you get to the truth and beauty of the movement”, explains Sedda.
A work of great intensity, much applauded, on her international tour and expected to win in Spain. With drums constantly ringing, the rhythm becomes faster and faster to transport the dancer to a kind of ecstasy physical and mental.
Another long awaited show was The Uncanny Valley of the collective German Rimini Protokoll, scheduled from Friday until Sunday. A piece of surprising and disturbing starring a robot totally human with the face of a real person, the writer Thomas Melle, which does not appear on the scene but in the videos projected.
throughout the function the robot is going to relate her biography (Nick) as if they were their own in a story studded with projections, in which are photographs of when I was a child or young person and videos that collected in other episodes of his life, which causes a lot of strangeness. It is what he pursues this work: the viewer to experience for yourself the sense that the robotista japanese christened as the “valley haunting” ( uncanny valley in English, hence the title of the show), which occurs when a machine that pretends to imitate the perfection of a human makes a gesture, even if it is just the blink of an eye, which is perceived as artificial. What is better than robots as closely as possible to the human or to make it clear that they are machines?
Friday was much applauded Là a beautiful show of the company Baró d Evel starring a man, a woman and a crow, already excited at its premiere at the Lliure in Barcelona in September.
