Troubleyn | Jan Fabre

Quando l'Uomo Principale e una donna

A dance solo for Lisbeth Gruwez

Dancer Lisbeth Gruwez, who already worked with Fabre in the past on other productions, highlights clichés about men, in her attitude, the way she looks at the audience, her cocky behaviour, in the first part of this solo dance. The magic tricks with two metal balls symbolise the fact that she is continuously tooling with her gender. The dry martini she mixes is an ironic reference to the ultimate macho, James Bond. Meanwhile olive oil drips down from the bottles that she suspended above the stage.

Once the oil starts flowing across the stage Gruwez slips, slides and transforms from a human into an animal, from a straight line into a circle, from a man into a women and subsequently into an androgynous creature. The use of olive oil enhances the performance with several connotations: medical, cosmetic, Christian, etc. The fluidity expressed in the continuous shape-shifting and transformations and in the choreography also serves as a metaphor for the image of womanhood which Fabre proposes in his work and which was already expressed in the monologues of Els Deceukelier. An image of a woman, beyond the organic, as a branched network of energy.

Fabre was inspired for this solo by Yves Klein’s anthropometry performances, whereby bodies are used as paint brushes. The well-known Italian pop song, Volare, which is played during the solo, is a reference to his Leap into the Void.

After over 120 performances in Belgium and abroad the Korean dancer, Sung-Im Her took over from Gruwez from 2006 onwards.  

Credits
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direction, scenography Jan Fabre choreography Jan Fabre dancer Lisbeth Gruwez dramaturgy  Miet Martens assistance Marina Kaptijn music Maarten Van Cauwenberghe / Domenico Modugno "Nel Blu Dipinto di Blu" (Volare)

light design Jan Fabre, Pieter Troch costumes Daphne Kitschen

technical coordination Geert Vanderauwera, Pieter Troch production management Mark Geurden

production Troubleyn/Jan Fabre (Antwerp - Belgium) in co-production with Théâtre de la Ville (Paris - France), deSingel (Antwerp - Belgium) with the support of the Festival Iberoamericano de Teatro de Bogotá

première 26.03.2004, Festival Iberoamericano de Teatro de Bogotá, Bogotá

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