Projects: “The Room/enLLOC”

- Why are we here, who put us in this room, what are we supposed to do...
- Who are these people - Why are we here together - Do we want to be - Didn't we want to be alone...

Six characters in a box. A blank white room. Isolated from the outside, and insulated within.
Trapped but protected. Dangerous only to themselves. Some struggle to identify themselves some fight for anonymity.
Observed and ignored: that which is fundamental to them is inconsequential to us.
Removed but significant: their struggle is to identify, to qualify, define and find reason however ridiculous it seems.
In the blackness of human nature we examine hope. We watch acts of altruism, but are they truly selfless or an another ploy to obtain ones own benefit.

Objectives in the Choreography

The Room/ enLLOC will be my 10th production with Thomas Noone Dance and looking back through previous works I observe myself pursuing specific themes and investigating certain lines of movement. In The Room/ Lloc I wish to further the understanding of these mecha-nisms and also test both the dancers and myself to create a work where the physical move-ment content can be read as an emotional text. To this end I set myself following objectives.

- To investigate of the line of movement started in the recent creation Tone based in sec-tions of gestuality moved into a more abstract sense. The movement also had an element of irony, and sought to balance the dark subject matter with an element of humour. - To intersperse formal lineal sections of dance with looser less defined sections, yet to retain a control on the movement quality and the visual texture. To investigate lines of informed improvisation and ask of the dancers spontaneous decisions on stage.

- To continue the extensive use of partnered dance, or dance of contact as has been the trend up to the present. I find that the use of partnered work and the great variety of manners available to use contact (and its absence) a very powerful tool in communicating with the audience. I also wish to deepen my understanding of this medium. - To create longer sections or scenes than in previous works and to move from one scene to another without visible rupture, i.e. finding smoother modulations of the visual within these blocks in a progressive manner, avoiding the fragmentation that I observe in my earlier works. This will also allow for greater visual impact of abrupt scene changes that will be used to punctuate the work.

This objective is directly related to the experience gained creating Four where the per-formance was divided into four 15 minutes sections with a specific music of a clearly defined nature (composed for the performance) for the entire episode. The same criteria have also since been applied to the creation Mur in its remounting during 2007.

- To clearly define the character assumed by each dancer in the piece and to associate a particular type of movement to each one. At the same time that these specific traits are developed, a global movement texture must be retained, giving an overall unity and identity to the piece, and a performance recognisable within the style that the company has established to date.

The Collaborators

The conception of the show in these terms lead me to consider suitable collaborators. From the conception of the idea I had decided that performance would take place in a large white room, and so I required the participation of a set designer. My recent experience working in the TNC on the production Vitages a la Felicitat had put me in contact with Max Glaenzel and Estel Cristià i Margenat. Their propositions for that production, the diverse experience that they showed in previous projects working on various different scales, added to both the modernity and simplicity of their design made them an obvious choice.

For some time I have also been working with the composer Diego Dall’Osto and we have been looking for the opportunity to investigate two themes. The first was finding a electronic music both highly individual and also slightly surreal. The second was the intelligent incorporation of technology. Using new media we wanted to somehow connect the dance with the musical development during the show, to let the dance recapture some of the control on its environment. The Room/Lloc provided the perfect opportunity for this investigation.

The Set

Blank white Room. With concealed accesses. Covered initially with hundreds of grey felt cushions hiding a coloured floor. The cushions are used to create spaces within the dance space piled up to construct enclosures, made to cover the walls of the room, used by the dancers in specific scenes to fight one another, conceal themselves, sit and so on.

The concept of confinement here has allows two interpretations. That the people are confined to kept them away from others, or that they are being protected from something exterior. The first of the two conceptions that of imprisonment then is portrayed in the construction of the room, in this case a large white room without entrance or exit, and with the large viewing window that is the opening to the public. that could be conceived as a institution.

When considering the concept of the room and the ideas of isolation and survival, the work of the artist Joseph Beuys came to mind. The ideas of survival that pervade his work and influence his execution thereof were pertinent to the work I perceived and although I wished to make no direct reference to his works I found the use felt very relevant. Wishing to somehow dress the space and with the idea of a material that could give a feeling of protection and yet have other connotations I perceived that the set should be initially covered by a multitude of felt cushions or blocks. The soft nature of the object implies comfort and protection yet amassed on the floor give the idea of a cushioned surface and reinforces the feeling of a pad-ded cell.

The Set Designers Viewpoint

"A room, closed, white. No entrances or exits. A hermetic volume, formed from an opaque, impermeable material reflecting an unseen exterior. Hard, cold, rough walls trap the same people they protect, comfort or torture. Within this space we find another element recondi-tioning it; covering and dividing, arranging and disorganising, darkening and changing. This object determines the relation between the trapped subject and his/her cell, determines whether they are comfortable or awkward, intimate or public, repressed or protected. These felt cushions, though objects, create space and are the intermediary between individuals and in turn are the metaphor of their relation with the space."

Max Glaenzel Ribas i Estel Cristià i Margenat

The Music

An integration of Polyphonic music early both sacred and profane music combined with electronic soundscapes, both rhythmic and percussive and open and arrhythmic.

My idea originated from the desire to use religious music to connect with the sensation of a quest for meaning or "faith" and the religious rituals that might be associated. At the same time I wanted the music to be simple and primitive yet lyrical and to a certain extend beautiful, contrasting with the starkness of the situation. The music would always lend itself to a type of choreographic construction but I wished to avoid genres already well used in contemporary dance such as baroque music. Furthermore a religious aspect to the music could inform the space invoking various types of place without using decor changes.
However as I did not wish to use the pure form I called upon Diego Dall’Osto, an experienced electronic composer but also a musical academic in order that he might compose a score by transforming and blending the musical forms with the electronic.

The Composers Viewpoint “The musical project focuses on the idea of a modern composition inspired by ancient vocal music. The goal is to create a score based on contemporary languages and, at the same time, strongly intertwined with elements of an ancient spirit. The early music material basically comes from both sacred and secular music of the Middle Ages, mainly between XI and XIII centuries. It is music style characterised by expressive contrasts, with sharp sonorities and basic rhythmic modes in primordial poliphony, and melismatic dulcet melodies in monodic chants. The relation between remote tradition and impellent modernity is multifaceted and characterised by different musical processes: dialogue, contrast, hybridation, extrapolation, deformation, transfiguration, etc. The whole operation is reinforced by combining the traditional music with the electronically produced material, both original and obtained by digital processing. Voices will be pre-recorded and then processed and assembled by computer. Diego Dall'Ost Calendar: Phase I: Previa saT! Sant Andreu Teatre, September 2007 in the Merce Celebrations. First draft, five dancers, cushions and basic sound track. Phase II: Second presentation 2nd of October 2009 TNT Dance Festival, Terrassa, Barcelona. First original electronic sound track composed by Diego Dall'Osto and, six dancers. Phase III: Pre-premiere in the saT theatre, 31st March, Barcalona 2010. Full set. Phase IV: Oficial temporada in Barcelona October 2010.

COLLABORATORS:

THE COMPOSER:

Diego Dall’Osto: Roma 1961.

Diego Dall’Osto has worked extensively creating music for dance. With the choreographer Jacopo Godani he has created pieces for Spanish National Ballet, Gothernburg Opera House, the Royal Ballet and the Ballet de Monte Carlo and with the choreographer Nicole Fonte for Det Kongelige Teatre de Copenhagen, Het Stadettlei Bern Ballet and Het Konilijk Ballet van Vlaadern. He has also worked with Carlos Ituurioz creating Incert Insert. He has won numerous prizes in Italy and was granted a scholarship by the IUA-PHONOS UPF (Instituto Audiovisual de la Universitat Pompeu Fabra de Barcelona).

Diego Dall’Osto has collaborated previously with Thomas Noone creating the music for Crush, which won both the production prize and the public’s prize at the Guglielmo Ebreo Competition in Pesaro Italy during the Biennale Danza e Italia and is currently working on the piece Tort.

THE SET DESIGNERS:

Max Glaenzel Ribas i Estel Cristià i Margenat

Since forming their collaborative relation in 1993, max glaenzel i estel cristià have collaborated in more than 60 productions in a great variety of formats. They have combined both the small scale or in alternative spaces such as “plou a barcelona” in the Sala Beckett to large-scale productions such as “2666” in the Lliure or "dissabte, diumenge i dilluns" in TNC.

They have worked with most of the top directors in Catalonia including Sergi Belbel, Toni Casares, Carlota Subiros, Roger Nernat, Alex Rigola, Carles Alfaro and Lurdes Barba amongst others varying from the traditional to the very contemporary.

THE LIGHT DESIGNER: