SERRADIFALCO. Officially presented in Serradifalco (Caltanissetta), on the preview day, the sixth edition of Performare Festival, an event that puts contemporary dance and artistic research at the center of its action, with a rich program made up of shows, performances, creative residencies, workshops and in-depth meetings, which will be scheduled from 2 to 13 July.
The Festival, promoted by the IN ARTE Association, with the recognition of the Ministry of Culture, is curated by the artistic direction of Simona Miraglia and Amalia Borsellino of the SicilyMade Collective, who over the years have strengthened the precious collaboration with the Municipality of Serradifalco which guarantees the use of municipal places of culture and urban spaces. The event also benefits from the support of the Department of Tourism, Sport and Entertainment of the Sicilian Region, the Sicana Foundation – SICILBANCA and various private individuals who contribute to the growth of the Festival.
This year too there are important collaborations with various local entities, including supporters and cultural partners, with whom Performare Festival shares the desire to promote and disseminate contemporary dance through quality proposals. Among these there are: Scenario Pubblico, Center of Significant National Interest for Dance, the Liceo Coreutico R. Settimo, Latitudini – Sicilian network of contemporary dramaturgy, Marosi, the Etnea Musical Association ETS, Incastro Festival.
Moon landing is the theme chosen for the sixth edition of Performare Festival and, according to the intentions of the artistic direction, it represents a landing on the “celestial” object of contemporary research. In fact, over the course of twelve days, the municipality of Serradifalco becomes an open air stage for local, national and international artists. Their activities “invade” the town and the community, with the aim of creating a festival climate that encourages exchange, comparison and discovery of the contemporary.
“Holding the reins of a Festival dedicated to contemporary research in a place like Serradifalco is certainly a great challenge. The special mission to which we have dedicated ourselves in recent years has been to seek, in small steps, a link between the community and the sensitivity towards the contemporary, still mysterious terrain. For this reason, in the first three-year ministerial period, we considered it appropriate to identify the theme of Space, understood in its broadest sense”, declare the two artistic directors Simona Miraglia and Amalia Borsellino.
Among the guests of Performare Festival there are big names on the European scene together with many rising stars of national and regional choreography: Florencia Demestri, Samuel Lefeuvre, Silvia Gribaudi, Claudio Cremonesi, Emanuela Serra/Balletto Civile, Chiara Marolla, Cinzia Sità, Gioia Morisco , Nicola Simone Cisternino, Francesco Colaleo and Maxime Freixas/Cie MF, Marco Laudani, Glenda Gheller, Emilia Guarino, Agnese Canicattì, Delfina Stella, Salvatore Cappello, Danilo Smedile and Collettivo SicilyMade.
This year too, to support the busy program of shows and performances of the guest companies, there will be the Performare Project initiatives, which will involve some of the artists in laboratory activities dedicated to higher education and artistic research on site, to creative activities dedicated community involvement and artistic residency activities to develop new projects.
The Performare Project section of the festival is divided into different categories and includes numerous variations:
The artists invited to lead the workshops in residence for the Creation and Research section intended for higher education are: Silvia Gribaudi, Florencia Demestri and Samuel Lefeuvre.
The “Empathic Bodies |” workshop will take place from 2 to 6 July Performative Public Gym” conceived and conducted by Silvia Gribaudi, an artist who focuses her work on the social impact of the body, putting comedy at the center of language. The object of the research will be the artistic practices of empathy and training in the square created by the artist to experience the activation of participatory relationship processes.
From 9 to 13 July “Bending reality” will be held by Florencia Demestri and Samuel Lefeuvre: a work that explores movement in a multifaceted way, through a physical practice based on fantasy and imagination. The workshop will focus on sharing with the participants the research process carried out by the two artists who, since 2012, have collaborated to create choreographies with a focus on the public’s perception of reality.
Still in the Creation and Research area, we find a path aimed at the community: from 2 to 4 July Gioia Morisco will lead “Ma_donne in blue jeans”, a dance theater workshop intended for women aged 18 and over, without age limits. The artist’s choreographic research starts from the experience of bodies, from postures and iconographic references to the feminine, creating a shared poetic imagination, which gradually leads to movement. To participate, no previous experience is required but the desire to get involved.
The Next Generation section of the projects is intended for young students in the area, and offers an intensive creative residency within the Performare Festival, which concludes in an original performance, with the participation of the students involved in the experience. This year, the young author Simone Nicola Cisternino, artist associated with Twain Dance Production Center of the Lazio Region, was invited, who will lead the Billi – Rocking Lab residency workshop from 1 to 5 July.
The Kids section includes various activities aimed at the little ones, through experiences of raising awareness of body languages, proposing the experience of movement as an element of play, creation and discovery of the territory. Children will be called to be active and reflective protagonists of artistic research. This is the detail of the activities:
On 3 July Emilia Guarino will hold the workshop If the bees are few, intended for boys and girls aged 7 to 10. Delfina Stella is organizing Every Face is a Home on 4 July and from 8 to 10 July, aimed at boys and girls aged 4 to 6 (and their parents). On 5 July Marta Greco will curate Movimento in gioco, intended for boys and girls aged 7 to 10. Finally, Salvatore Cappello is organizing the Acro-dance workshop from 8 to 10 July, for girls and boys aged 12 to 16.
The Landscape and Community section focuses on the regeneration of other spaces, in dialogue between an artist foreign to the territory and the historicity and traditions of Serradifalco. This year the French company Cie MF was invited, with Maxime Freixas and Francesco Colaleo for the Chef d’œuvre project, which has the theme of Cuisine, a place where tradition and innovation meet. Furthermore, the young dancer Agnese Canicattì will be in residence to create the performance Soprano_in a land_scape, connecting body and nature, through the landscape of the nature reserve of Lake Soprano.
Finally, the Dynamic Narrations section, intended for generation Z, offers a training course that aims to educate in the conscious vision of contemporary performing arts. In this context, the PAC Table is scheduled, curated by Sofia Bordieri, a laboratory that includes guided enjoyment of the shows, writing activities, moments dedicated to social and radio communication, interviews with artists, active participation in meetings and open debates. The participants will try their hand at writing texts that will be collected and published under the “The best youth” section of the PAC – paneacqueculture magazine.
