HUMAN LANDSCAPES
Germana Civera invitée par Core Dance Performing Arts / Atlanta
This France-Atlanta event is made possible with the support of :
FUSED: French-US Exchange in Dance, a program of the New England Foundation for the Arts’ National Dance Project, the Cultural Services of the French Embassy in the United States, and FACE Foundation, with lead funding from the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation, the Florence Gould Foundation, and the French Ministry of Culture and Communication.
Germana Civera a connu l'expérience de sortir d'une dictature. Elle a connu cela dans sa vie de jeune femme européenne. Elle l'a connu dans sa position d'artiste attirée par toutes les recherches. Elle l'a connu en corps et en esprit. Elle l'a connu, elle l'a forgé, à travers sa pratique de la danse. Quatre décennies plus tard, la question persiste, s'aiguise, s'amplifie à nouveau, de refuser tout nouvel enfermement. En actes, cela passe par l'invention de sa rencontre avec la compagnie CORE dance ATLANTA, qui l'invite à travailler à son côté. Retour à la fin des années 70. La mort du Général Franco. Germana Civera éprouve le mouvement irrépressible de la sortie d'un enfermement. C'est chez elle un mouvement vers la danse. Egalement une sortie de son propre pays, de l'Espagne vers la France. On y vit alors le crépitement inventif de ce qu'on appellera la Nouvelle Danse. Germana Civera y est une interprète et collaboratrice en vue de Mathilde Monnier. Ses pièces marquent la scène chorégraphique de l'époque. La danse s'y vit comme expérience avant toute chose. La danse s'y pratique au frottement de la conscience sociale.
Germana Civera a l'audace de ses inventions propres. Au côté du plasticien Laurent Goldring, elle réalise Figures. Le regard sur ce qui fait un visage, son volume, sa matérialité, et non ses seuls traits de reconnaissance, sortira bouleversé de cette exposition de sculpture-performance. Laquelle ne cessera plus de faire référence. Une autre sortie des cadres sera l'immense pièce Fuero(n). Germana Civera y implique une multitude d'intervenants de tous âges et tous niveaux. Jamais la pièce ne se dénoue dans une forme aboutie attendue. Toujours Fuero(n) s'invente comme un moment de vie, qui déborde, s'expanse, largement imprévisible. On y refuse l'enfermement dans toute catégorie. Ce pari fou sera salué par l'obtention de divers prix.
Si Germana Civera maîtrise solidement un panel complet de techniques et de styles de danse, son geste se joue toujours ailleurs que dans un souci de référencement. Ce geste s'élabore à même l'immersion du corps dans la performance expérimentale de ses sensations traversées. La danse est une situation, un lien, une circulation. Tout cela au contact du monde. Des autres. Non un modèle fixé dans une figure arrêtée sur une indexation virtuose. Le corps est sismographe. Son bain est la société. Ses gestes naissent de la perception. L'intelligence vit dans toutes les cellules. Non dans le seul cerveau. La chorégraphe se souvient de sa jeunesse vécue en Espagne, dans un milieu résistant au régime franquiste. On y avait conscience que l'émancipation ne tenait pas qu'à l'institution politique, mais, plus largement, plus profondément, à une critique anti-disciplinaire de toutes les dimensions de la vie. A commencer par l'ordre du corps. Sa famille, pionnière en la matière, s'intéressait aux méthodes d'éveil corporel et d'éducation somatique, qui libèrent un imaginaire sensoriel.
Cette vertu libératrice est-elle toujours aussi vive, en 2017, dans les pratiques de la danse ? Après les embellies de la recherche ouverte, n'y vit-on pas le retour des certitudes, la restauration des cadres, et des évaluations ? Il y a lieu de le craindre, en résonance avec le retour des vents mauvais, qui rabattent les sociétés sur leur enfermement, sur la construction de nouveaux murs, la généralisation du contrôle, du contingentement disciplinaire.
Dans un transport très loin de chez elle, au contact de danseurs d'un autre continent, on sent le réveil de nouveaux défis, contre tout enfermement, au moment où Germana Civera entame sa collaboration avec la compagnie CORE dance ATLANTA.
Gérard MAYEN, critique de danse 16 juin 2017
©Simon Gentry
Human Landscapes
The migrations of beings, gestures, and stories
“Human Landscapes” was choreographed and conceptualized by Germana Civera, with Sound Design by Didier Aschour. It is an embodied reflection on history, memory, travel, encounters, the migration of beings, gestures and stories. Choreographer Germana Civera draws on her family’s own years in exile during the Spanish Civil War to create a multi-sensory performance in which the audience moves throughout the venue, following seven dancers on a migrant journey.
In an age marked by global dispersion and displacement, “Human Landscapes” seeks to address the physical and mental forms of alienation that unite all migrant subjects, regardless of era, culture and circumstances. It focuses on the stories and discourses of migration, the imaginary and poetics of migration and the transmission of exile experiences through history, memory, music, landscapes and choreography.
Human landscapes was performed in Atlanta, Houston, and France.
CULTURAL SERVICES FRENCH EMBASSY IN THE UNITED STATES
Interview conducted in November 2017 by Nicole Birmann Bloom, Program Officer Performing Arts
Choreographer Germana Civera in Atlanta
Germana Civera, choreographer and performance artist from Spain based in Montpellier, France, just completed a two-week residency with Core Dance Company, Atlanta. The performance Human Landscapes – The Migration of Beings, Gestures, and Stories was born from this residency and then it was presented to the public at The B-Complex from October 26 to October 29, 2017, as part of France-Atlanta 2017. Germana shared time with us on her way back to Montpellier.
Nicole Birmann Bloom: Dear Germana, could you tell us more about your two-week residency with Core Dance Company?
Germana Civera: The two-week residency with Core Dance Company was dedicated to the creation of the performance piece Human Landscapes. It was rich with encounters, exchanges and…yes, dis-placements.
Extra time was held to develop artistic interactions – workshop with non-professionals, lectures and talks that led to a better awareness of the cultural and artistic environment of Atlanta, to a better knowledge of the diversity of the audience that included children and refugees. Then, all these elements merged in several performances that were presented at The B Complex Gallery, a deserted industrial space. This is how we participated in the France-Atlanta Festival in this open and diverse context.
Nicole: How did you meet with Core Dance? Who were the dancers?
Germana: This was an unexpected and direct encounter. We met in France at the Centre de Developpement Chorégraphique (CDC) in Toulouse. I was there as a teacher for the professional training program called Extensions. Core Dance Company was there too, performing in Toulouse, the “Pink City”; they came to my morning class and we met. My way of working blended extremely well with their curiosity, their availability and ability to understand the work. It was «a coup de foudre», love at first sight. Then later, Sue Schroeder, the artistic director of Core came to Toulouse to meet with me and six months later, she invited me to work with them. Genial!
Nicole: Was it your first experience in the United States?
Germana: As a dancer, I had the opportunity to dance in New York and Washington when we toured with French artists I worked with, a while ago. As a choreographer, it is the first time I have presented my work in the United States.
Nicole: “Human Landscapes” deals with questions related to exile and migrations. What led you to approach this specific topic while being in Atlanta? What were the most challenging moments with the dancers and what surprised you?
Germana: Professor Alexis Nouss would say «suspension between space and time»: the link between Europe and America is the perfect illustration of what he named “exiliance” (*).
The subject of otherness is at the heart of my artistic process. To be more accurate, my research is based upon exchange and circulation, far from any concern related to ownership. So the encounter is part of my work process and artistic intention. Dance is par excellence an artistic practice that travels, moves from one place to the other; it also maintains an open eye and dialogue with and towards the world. I am a woman, a mother, a citizen, and a witness of the global migrant phenomenon. This moves me, dis-places me, and sets me up in a creative movement. I am deeply stirred by questions of “exiliance” because I am a person living in exile. So, obviously, the time came for me to more deeply investigate the subject and share this experience through a work such as Human Landscapes.
After one performance, I had a very precious encounter with an audience member, a woman refugee from Libia, who came to express her gratitude towards the work and how she felt deeply touched by it. It was moving for both of us.
All dancers participating in the project surprised me with their artistic and physical potentials. The ensemble (or company) of Core Dance is built on qualities of attention, listening and curiosity. They all had the desire to go beyond what is possible. The most interesting moment and also the most delicate came up when we started to enter new territories. We had to go towards the unknown and above one’s own limits, such as getting rid of preconception and models. It is essential for an artistic project and we did it.
Nicole: Could you describe your work with Didier Aschour, Director of Centre national de création musicale (GMEA), in Albi, in relation to Human Landscapes.
Germana: With Didier, we have been working together for a long time. It is a collaboration I deeply value. Our research has mutual resonance and look towards similar goals. It is as if we read the mind of the other; we don’t need much time talking.
For Human Landscapes, I imagined a musical and sound score that would bring together several styles and patterns interweaving each other in a non-linear way. It would take elements from diverse sources: Literature, cinema, music… I shared my ideas with Didier wondering if it was possible. It looked complicated but Didier devised the perfect system that I used and nurtured with great pleasure and artistic endeavor. This system is freely inspired by Circus On (also known as Roaratorio), the 1979 score by John Cage, based upon James Joyce Finnegans Wake.
Nicole: What is your next project?
Germana: These days, I am deep into Musique Rapide et Lente, based upon the book of the same name (published in 2014) by Cyrille Martinez with whom I have been working for a while. Didier is also part of this new work. It is about adolescence, how teens see the world in general, and more specifically the art world. For the two past years, I have met with teens from various classes and cities of the South of France (Sète, Nîmes, Montpellier).
My work deals with the transversality of the arts, but I also attempt to bring together the art of dance and people. Dance is not just one hour of performance. Dance, for me, is to give substance and sense to dance as a live art, and it also happens during non-spectacular actions such as workshops. And I pursue this goal with awareness, persistence and pleasure.
Today the creation of Musique rapide et lente involves a group of young teens, a new generation with promising futures. It will be at Théâtre le Périscope, in Nîmes, on March 9 and 10, 2018.
Thank you !
To know more about Germana's experience in Atlanta, watch here
(*) Concept of Exiliance by Prof. Alexis Nouss: Condition and Consciousness
As an existential core in the experience lived by all migrants, whatever the historical and cultural cir- cumstances are, exiliance is both a condition and a consciousness. However, they may not be in sync: one could feel in exile without really be exiled or one could be exiled without feeling it. Among other sources, Kafla’s America provides the material to study this phenomenon in its ethical dimension. Other issues to be addressed are the representation of exilic experience and the link between death and exile.
Interview conducted in November 2017 by Nicole Birmann Bloom, Program Officer Performing Arts
Dance News Desk Oct. 3, 2017
Core Performance Company and international choreographer Germana Civera will present the world premiere of Human Landscapes, a new collaborative dance piece that is a featured work of France-Atlanta 2017, a series of events centered on innovation, and designed to foster cooperation between France and the Southeast. The performances will be on October 26 - 29, 2017 at The B-Complex in Atlanta, Georgia. Tickets are $15 and are available at coredance.org.
Human Landscapes is a collaborative work between Association Inesperada and Core Performance Company, and seeks to express through dance the physical and mental forms of alienation that unite all migrants and immigrants. It focuses on the stories and discourses of migration, and exemplifies what it's like to be displaced, exiled, and constantly in motion.
Performed to an original score by Didier Aschour, choreographer Germana Civera draws on her family's own years in exile during the Spanish Civil War to create a multi-sensory performance in which the audience moves throughout the venue, following eight dancers on a migrant journey.
We went to speak with Spanish Choreographer, Germana Civera, at Core Dance studios, to preview her collaboration with Core entitled “Human Landscapes”. As in other choreographies, Germana touches on the topics of migrations of beings, gestures, and stories. She draws on her family’s own years in exile during the Spanish Civil War to create a multi-sensory performance in which the audience moves throughout the venue, following eight dancers on a migrant journey. Human Landscapes is part of this year’s France Atlanta week, and it will be performed on the main gallery at the B Complex in Atlanta. By
Felipe Barral