photo: Vincent Riebeek
For the Berlin contemporary dance world January is one of the most important months of the year due to the festival Tanztage at the Sophiensaele. This year’s edition has a new artistic director, Anna Müller, and the focus is the interdisciplinary nature of many young artists whose playing field is not just restricted to dance. They set out to discover new worlds or genres and address choreographic issues in pop culture such as: striptease and breakdance, club culture, talk shows and pop music. All things we actually like and want to see on stage more often.
(Side note: Of course I just want to see male strippers on stage because of their effect on my social perception. Male stripping is seen as a social deviance and through its performances creates a sort of equality in relation to the predominantly normative female stripping, giving the women in the audience the feeling of empowerment. And of course I have to take in consideration the visual pleasure I receive as a side-effect from such an important cultural step into gender equality. Therefore I see it as my personal duty to go to any show were hot male stripping is promised on the flyer.)
The eleven day long performance marathon with nine premieres and five revivals invites the audience to discover new choreographic talents and to enjoy contemporary dance in this beautiful theater. Of course we should not forget to mention the fabulous party that will take place there tonight. If you have just a quick look into the program of the 24th edition of the festival you get the feeling as if almost any show has some queer topic. Actually not very surprising since the contemporary dance world consists to 80% of gay men and 20% of feminist women (of course just a superficial assumption based on my subjective experience and not on real statistics) Some recommendations after the jump.
Since on the program has so many options I will try to help you through it with my suggestions. I just warn you by saying that I did not see any of the pieces I am now recommending before. So I might be wrong.
photo: Boyz in the Woods
First thing that sounds pretty hilarious is happening tonight. Berlin Boyz in the Woods cast a Sunsational Circle around the theater and create a concert performance gathering that brings together chants, bass lines, bodies, objects, spirituality and experience. It’s like a sect of gay men just looking fashionable and trying to seduce us with fake magic (I like!).
As I promised you male stripping before I should rather not disappoint you now. Therefore I recommend to check out Vincent Riebeek’s performance called Flaming Lamborghini . Apparently there are some giant dildos involved. Maybe he also plays with ice cream like he did in this Gif we shooted with him in 2013.
Meet me as a Stranger by Jeannine Simon
Last but not least I would recommend the piece called Meet me as a Stranger mixing contemporary dance with some break dance. I just like the trailer very much. It looks very sensual and intense to me (and they both look amazing)
As pointed out before this recommendations are just a start point. Check out the whole program yourself and have fun with it. Also feel free to join the opening party tonight.
If you need some more inspiration I recommend to watch the video above of Vincent Riebeek’s performance called Power Point Presentation. (how Pornceptual can you be???)
