HYDROLOGY
— 2007
Music and gestures performed in a dance choreography.
Hydrology is a 15 minutes long work that mixes contemporary dance together with electronic and instrumental music. It was presented at the Hygienemuseum Dresden during the festival TanzHerbst 07 (November 2007).
The choreography created by Alessandra Fabbri was inspired by an essay written in 1942 by Gaston Bachelard: L’Eau et le Rêves. Essai sur l’imagination de la matière. The electronic music was composed by Manolo Magnabosco.
I choose to play sounds that fitted the space (a big room with unrefined walls and floor and a really high ceiling, like a factory) and the electronic track, in a dialogue at the same time with the dance movements, the narration of the choreography and the electronic effects.
The stage design was mainly based on the use of plastic because of the sound of the material and because of the reflection of the lights on it (the theme of the entire show was “wasser”).
I wore a plastic costume with a long skirt’s train. I was alone on stage moving/dancing through the space during the introduction of the piece (3 minutes) and during the final part (1 minute).
Between these acting parts, I played following a score created by me, made of sketches and patterns used to improvise with/on the electronic music with harp and percussions.
Selected works that fascinated me while I was thinking about this project:
— Gaston Bachelard, Psicanalisi delle acque, translated by Marta Cohen Hemsi and Anna Chiara Peduzzi, Milano, Red, 2006 (Original edition: L’Eau et le Rêves. Essai sur l’imagination de la matière, Paris, José Corti, 1942).
— Elliot Caplan, Beach Birds For Camera, USA, 1992, b&w/color/sound, 35mm, 28’. Choreography: Merce Cunningham. Music: John Cage. Dancers: Merce Cunningham Dance Company.
— Brian Morton, Charlotte Moorman. Candy-coated, gravity-defying, streamline baby, in The Wire, n.283, September 2007, pp. 24- 27.
— Steve Smith, Zeena Parkins & Ikue Mori. Strange Fruit, in The Wire, n. 248, October 2004, pp. 36-41.