In “7 Pleasures” by the Danish choreographer and dancer Mette Ingvartsen the audience can experience at first hand how notions of nudity and sexuality have changed over time.
Talk following the performance on
Sun 27/09
The idea of exploring the body – one’s own, but also someone else’s – runs like a thread through the internationally acclaimed works of Mette Ingvartsen. The political aspect of the body is always a focal point, how it is perceived and its function as a statement in itself. The focus of her latest work “7 Pleasures”, which is set to premiere at steirischer herbst, relates to different aspects of pleasure, hedonism and sensuality. As a stage collective, twelve performers execute a long, expansive movement in seven stages. They feel their way towards other bodies, their skin, testing their boundaries, engaging in unexpected constellations, and also exploring the question: how can we use the joyful potential of pleasure to disrupt images attached to nudity and sexuality?
When Ingvartsen, who staged “evaporated landscapes” and “Giant City” at steirischer herbst in 2009, ventures into the sometimes uncanny realm of pleasure, it is not just about giving free rein to sensations in their search for expression. The subject also raises a number of pressing and ultimately political issues: how to celebrate other forms of pleasure than those offered by everyday life, social conventions and the norms of politically correct gender relations?
Concept and choreography Mette Ingvartsen
With Sirah Foighel Brutmann, Johanna Chemnitz, Katja Dreyer, Bruno Freire, Elias Girod, Dolores Hulan, Ligia Manuela Lewis, Danny Neyman, Norbert Pape, Pontus Pettersson, Hagar Tenenbaum & Marie Ursin
Replacement Ghyslaine Gau
Light Minna Tiikkainen
Light assistance Nadja Räikkä
Stage Mette Ingvartsen & Minna Tiikkainen
Music & Soundtrack Peter Lenaerts, with music by Will Guthrie (Breaking Bones)
Dramaturgy Bojana Cvejić
Choreography assistant Manon Santkin
Technical direction Joachim Hupfer
Sound engineering Adrien Gentizon
Production Kerstin Schroth
Production assistant Manon Haase
Produced by Mette Ingvartsen / Great Investment
Co-produced by steirischer herbst, Kaaitheater, HAU Hebbel am Ufer, Festival d’Automne, Les Spectacles vivants – Centre Pompidou, Théâtre National de Bretagne, PACT Zollverein, Dansens Hus, Tanzquartier Wien, Kunstencentrum BUDA, BIT Teatergarasjen & Dansehallerne
Funded by the Flemish Authorities, Hauptstadtkulturfonds (Berlin) & The Danish Arts Council
A House on Fire co-production with the support of the Culture Programme of the European Union
Thanks to Musée de la Danse/Centre Chorégraphique National de Rennes et de Bretagne.
Research und residence support by APAP with support by the Culture Programme of the European Union
steirischer herbst
Project management Theresa Adamski & Roland Gfrerer
Technical management Karl Masten
Technical management Grazer Spielstätten Kurt Schulz
Mette Ingvartsen (DK)
Mette Ingvartsen was born in 1980 in Århus/Denmark and works as a choreographer and dancer. By the mid-1990s she was already taking part in several dance collaborations, subsequently studying at the Hogeschool voor der Kunsten in Amsterdam and the Performing Arts Research and Training Studios (P.A.R.T.S.) in Brussels from 1999 to 2004. In 2002 Ingvartsen presented her first independently conceived performance, “Solo Negatives”; 16 more were to follow over the years. Her most recent – “69 positions” – premiered in 2014 in Essen. Ingvartsen is studying for a doctorate at Uniarts Stockholm and has since 2013 been active as an artist-in-residence at the Kaaitheater Brussels. Apart from her solo pieces Ingvartsen also works regularly with other choreographers, including Boris Charmatz (“Expo Zero”, 2010) and Xavier Le Roy (“Floor Pieces”, 2010). Furthermore, she is part of the artistic team of Chris Dercon, designated head of Volksbühne Berlin (from 2017 onwards). In 2009, Mette Ingvartsen also appeared at steirischer herbst, presenting two works: “GIANT CITY” and “evaporated landscapes”.
