PERSONA collects and connects the individual and collaborative work by artists Pieter Desmet, Steffi Mennen & Jonathan De Maeyer, as well as giving time and space for their collaborative research the body as manifestation of identity
NEWS
PREMIERE KATHARSIS - APRIL 29, 2023 @ NTGent Minnemeers
On April 29th 2023 Katharsis, by Steffi Mennen, will premiere in NTGent Minnemeers on Dag van de Dans.
Katharsis is an ongoing research about time and personality. Do memories stay inside our body? How can we relive a memory through movement? How do we grasp something intangible?
The performers, all 60+, have had many experiences and memories, kept in storage within their body. Can we find a (movement)language to speak about these experiences and their effect on the body? Steffi uses not only movement to investigate the effect of time on personalities but she also guides the performers into using other media such as drawing, photography and writing. The artistic proces of Katharsis has created a collective identity.
These life experiences or moments in time pass by, is there a way to archive them?
CALENDAR
1-29 April 2023 - group exhibition
a sense of place with work by a.o. Jonathan De Maeyer
B-Part, Berlin, DE
29 April 2023 - premiere
Katharsis - Steffi Mennen
NTGent Minnemeers, Gent, BE
3 May 2023 - try-out
My August feels like December - Pieter Desmet
ClubSoda, Tilburg, NL
9 June 2023 - try-out
My August feels like December - Pieter Desmet
Zuidpool, Antwerpen, BE
3-7 July 2023 - workshop
Loose Control - Pieter Desmet
International Dace Week, Budapest, HU
24-28 July 2023 - workshop
Loose Control - Pieter Desmet
DO The Festival, PO
3 November 2023 - premiere
My August feels like December - Pieter Desmet
De Spil, Roeselare, BE
WORK BY JONATHAN AT GROUP EXHIBITION A SENSE OF PLACE
Jonathan has been invited by PEP (Photography Exploration Project), along with other artists, to show his work at the group exhibition a sense of place, which runs from April 1st until April 29th 2023 at B-Part in Berlin, Germany.
The exhibited artists show how their photographic practice can express "a sense of place" which, by definition, relates to how someone perceives and experiences an environment. It can be described as a conscious awareness or sensation of a region or location. This incorporates the physical nature of a place but also our emotional response to it, reflecting the way we connect with our environment. This feeling of belonging is essential and fragile at the same time, because it can be altered by external factors such as urban or climate change that can for example jeopardize the ancestral homeland and rights of certain communities. Photographs are also important in this sense because they contribute to the legacy that we leave for future generations, so they can see and feel our way of life and the deep connections we as individuals experience.
WORKSHOP LOOSE CONTROL THIS SUMMER IN HUNGARY & POLAND
This coming summer Pieter will be giving his workshop Loose Control at the International Dance Week Budapest in Hungary and at DO The Festival in Poland.
Loose Control is an amalgamation of various dance techniques from Pieter's past and present. In a playful way, different elements of contemporary, modern and classical dance techniques are merged with concepts from floor-, flow- and statework as well as ideas from the Ultima Vez-language, gymnastics, Bartienieff and ballet.
Pieter shares movements and phrases and proposes different ways to tackle them. Together with the dancers we look for authenticity within framed material. The workshop focusses on connecting physical and dynamic oppositions to each other in order to find different ways of performing movement.
! OFFICIAL NON-PROFIT ORGANISATION !
We are proud to announce that; since December 15th, 2022, Persona is officially a non-profit organisation with a beautiful Board of Directors consisting of Aïda Gabriëls, Joram Demeyer & Jef Van Den Abbeele.
2023, here we come!