Simple

Simple, rousing and undoubtedly one of the funniest contemporary dance pieces of recent years! In »Simple«, Argentinian choreographer Ayelen Parolin, who has lived in Belgium for 20 years, deprives herself of one of her most important dance partners – music. And yet the piece is anything but silent. Without music, it is up to the three dancers in their colourfully speckled, tight-fitting overalls to provide the rhythm. They use their bodies as percussion instruments, set the pace and rhythm and sweep the audience along with them. »Simple« is an homage to »Summerspace« (1958) by Merce Cunningham, one of the most famous works of modern dance, which radically broke with traditional notions of choreography. Ayelen Parolin simplifies the original into Dadaist fun: the performers tirelessly repeat the same sequences of movements, executing them with unusual gestures, weird jumps and baffled facial expressions. The topics of what remains unfinished and the return to the beginning are the central theme of the piece, a fascinating exercise in the construction and deconstruction of contemporary dance. Failure has never been as beautiful as in this stage catastrophe disguised as a dance piece, in which the three performers display a healthy sense of self-depreciation and allow themselves to be guided entirely by the pure, childlike joy of dance and movement.

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What the press say:

»A comedy bomb between cartoon and Merce Cunningham«
Libération

»An impressive spectacle«
sceneweb.fr
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