Director’s Notes

Why do we dance? This question arises before each new creation and the answer arrives, never complete, in the most unexpected moments: very short fragments, short peeks into an indefinable sensation. Moments when we realize that there is a greater sense of us, that we are an infinitesimal part of a vast cosmic design. Première takes life from the encounter of Andrea Costanzo Martini with the dancers of Balletto di Roma and from the fascination for these young artists who pursue their desire for movement, both as a personal feeling and as a common need. Première celebrates humanity, investigates the biographies, the unique and unrepeatable stories of each one. What alignment of stars and planets allowed them to be here on this stage, ready and willing to sacrifice something for us viewers?
Among military dances in the light of a digital bonfire and screens arranged almost like a dance troupe, Première reveals that a dance company is basically a village, a tribe, with its primary needs that try to be satisfied by the organization in codes and rules. Between lights and shadows, like in the spotlight.
Especially as a result of the events connected to the pandemic, after a long forced break away from the theaters, the question arises spontaneously: how to get back on stage? What drives us to exhibit, to expose ourselves to the public eye? What do we share? And what about us is impossible to hide when we are on stage? Première becomes a ritual made up of touching and intense applause, which are the only point of contact between the artists and the missed audience. A moment of reflection dedicated to all those who have worked and are still fighting for bringing the body back to life. A celebration in which dance is a medium that can recreate the conditions to start over. A return – again and again – to our first time.
Première is the experimentation of a brand new method of creation thanks to the “on-distance” collaboration between author and performers: in fact, the choreographer Andrea Costanzo Martini has guided the dancers of the Company through a digital screen, from Tel Aviv, where he lives; a real creative challenge, forced by the necessity of our present, but which has given life to new principles for the creation and realization of dance.

Credits

Choreography
Andrea Costanzo Martini

Lighting Design
Fabiana Piccioli

Costume Design
Shira Wise

Timing
60 minutes

supported by
MiBACT and SIAE,
within the initiative “Per Chi Crea”

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