Me during my paper presentation, photo by the LCFIR.

  

On April 25 I presented the paper "Crossing the Borders of Dance, Culture and Gender: Dada Masilo's Giselle (2017)" at the conference Somewhere in Between: Borders and Borderlands organised by the London Centre for Interdisciplinary Research and held at Birbeck, University of London. Here is the conference website. I Thank the Centre and all the participants for the great time I had, it was challenging and inspiring. Here are other photgraphs of the event:

 

Me showing an arm movement during my paper, photo by LCFIR

Me and Maciej Stasiowski, who presented his paper after me, during the q&a also with Fatima Zahra who was our chair, photo by LCFIR

 

My article on Martha Graham's dance "Notes for a Study of Lear"

 

 

 

My article, "This great stage of fools: Martha Graham's dance 'Notes for a Study of Lear'" has been published on the European Journal of American Culture some months ago. Here is the link to the abstract and other details.

Spadolini at the Fellini Museum

 

Alberto Spadolini, photo Dora Maar

 

 

In 1978 Marco Travaglini, Alberto Spadolini’s nephew, found a box filled with documents about his uncle. The box was put aside for years but in 2004, Travaglini began analysing those documents and was able to find many more. Quite a few of these documents are stunning photographs of Spadolini mainly in dance poses. Twenty-five of said photographs are now on display at the Fellini Museum in Rimini, Italy. The image chosen for the exhibition advertisement card is by Dora Maar and shows a graceful portrait of Spadolini, with a scarf around his neck and a small sphere in his left hand.

The exhibition opened on 24 March and was due to close on 16 April, but given the good response of the visitors, it has been extended until 1 May. On 30 March, 6 and 13 April the exhibition was also enriched by the screening of two documentaries: 2019 Spadò – Il danzatore nudo by Riccardo de Angelis and Romeo Marconi and 1951 Nous, les gitans by Alberto Spadolini himself.

I went to visit the exhibition on 13 April and was overwhelmed by the beauty of the photographs. Some of them have been published in my book on Spadolini (in Italian) and some in Travaglini’s books on his uncle. I commented the photographs for the visitors present that evening and seeing them all lined up was a feast for the eyes:

There was one of the very few images of Spadolini together with Josephine Baker where Baker is wearing a long tutu and ballet shoes, presumably for her ballet-insipred dances; there were some of the photographs portraying Spadolini as a nude dancer, like the one by Studio Piaz where he stands erect in a particularly virile pose; there was one portraying him in an Oriental costume, what I think might have been the costume for his work Cambodge, inspired by Cambodian culture; there were some dedicated to his Spanish-inspired dances, with a costume recalling that of a torero.

During the guided tour, ph. M. Travaglini

 Spadolini was a music hall dancer in 1930s Paris, but he also tried to move away from the music hall into theatre dance, as it happened with his 1933 Gala de danse, organised together with flamenco dancer Nati Morales.

The 2019 documentary presented a nice picture of Spadolini, with a focus on Travaglini’s 1978 discovery of the box, Spadolini’s ties with Gabiele d’Annunzio and his possible role as a spy during World War II. Here is the trailer (in Italian): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CVZlhLCvEgo

Spadolini’s own 1951 documentary was dedicated to Gypsy culture. There he appears in an interesting dance, in one of his almost nude attires. The documentary is also watchable online at the following link (it is in French): https://www.cinematheque.fr/henri/film/116989-nous-les-gitans-alberto-spadolini-1950/

This exhibition is an important event to celebrate Spadolini and his art as a dancer (he was also a painter, actor and a lot more) and I highly recommend it.

 

Ailey II now streaming (until 2 October 2022)

 

An image from The Hunt as performed by six men.

Two of Ailey II’s performances are now available on the Ailvin Ailey website and YouTube until October 2, see this link. Ailey II, as The New York Times has stated, is the younger version of the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater and is characterised by likewise energy and brilliance. The performances in question are Robert Battle’s The Hunt (2001) and Takademe (1999). Battle is the current artistic director of the Company and, in this case, has devised a refreshing change for both these works: The Hunt was originally danced by men while in this version it is performed by women and Takademe was a solo which is now danced by the whole Company.

The Hunt is an “athletic work for six men” that “reveals the predatory side of human nature and the primitive thrill of the hunt”. In this version danced by four women and restaged by Elisa Clark, the movement quality is different and there is a body fluidity absent in the initial work. The opening image recalls the rarefied atmosphere of an Edward Hopper’s painting thanks to Burke Wilmore’s striking lighting. The high-paced and percussive music by Les Tambours de Bronx immediately starts, creating a stark contrast with the dancers’ initial stillness. Then, as the dance begins, a vigorous pulsating energy emanates from the dancers’ bodies. They move in circles, bend their torso, walk, run and go to the floor mainly in pairs, but also all together. Mia McSwain’s costumes consist of long black skirts with red under layers and red tops. The skirts move along with the dancers’ movements creating a dazzling visual effect.

The title of this piece recalls Tero Saarinen’s Hunt (2002), a solo which represents his version of Nijinsky’s Rite of Spring, set to Stravinsky’s celebrated music. There, Saarinen plays with a long and wide skirt as well, a sort of white tutu made of panels of fabric where, at one point, images of himself are projected. There is a moonlike and hypnotising atmosphere. Saarinen’s intent was to focus on the giant quantity of information with which we are bombarded every day. In Battle’s The Hunt there is a raw energy and a physicality that bring the dancers to perform a tour de force without rest. We are almost left out of breath at the end of it. That is also why it is so brilliant! 

Takademe “mixes humor and high-flying movement in a savvy deconstruction of Indian Kathak dance rhythms”. Restaged by Kanji Segawa, it presents the whole Company instead of a solo interpreter. This means that the movement of the initial version is amplified and it reverberates through a collective group of dancers. In this case there is a more delicate and precise movement quality with respect to The Hunt. The dancers, for example, cross their arms, perform a small kick and bend in a flowy way. Sheila Chandra’s music contributes to this lighter atmosphere, highlighting each dancer’s move.

This dance reminded me of Martha Graham’s Satyric Festival Song (1932), a playful solo made of irony and wit, where the dancer jumps and walks tossing her hair up and down. Both these works are elegant and refined and humorous. I wonder how Graham’s solo would look like if it were performed by a group as Takademe was. Food for thought, thanks Ailey II!

My book in Italian on Alberto Spadolini

 

Nearly a year ago my book in Italian, Alberto Spadolini, Apollo della danza [Alberto Spadolini, Apollo of the Dance] was published by Affinità Elettive. Here is the translation of the book summary:

Alberto Spadolini (1907-1972) was a painter, dancer ad a lot more, but dance constitutes the fil rouge of his career. Born in a turbulent Ancona, he spent his formative years in Rome and had his debut in France in 1932, becoming famous as a music-hall dancer in La Joie de Paris, with Josephine Baker. In an interview he defines himself as ‘anarchist’ and in 1933 he performs in the Gala de danse, a performance of ‘pure’ dance where we can perceive an authorial line that distances him from the music-hall. In spite of the fact that he wears costumes of different kinds, he is classified as a ‘nude dancer’ by the press. This is due to his statuesque body that he shows in some dances. From the 1940s he begins to paint a series of paintings dedicated to ballerinas, recalling, in some aspects, Edgar Degas. Analysing even very rare documents, the present study explores the relationship Spadolini had with dance, illustrating another name with which he was known: Apollo of the Dance.

Published my essay on Alberto Spadolini's archive

My essay "Alberto Spadolini's Box: Dance, Silence and the Archive" has been published by Dance Research. Here more details.

Le scissure del covid project

 On August 18, 19 and 20 I took part to Le scissure del covid [the scissures of covid], an event promoted by La Mole in Ancona, Italy, its own project Presente and its call Off-Line. It was organised by choreographer, dancer, dance teacher and dance critic Stefania Zepponi and her Hexperimenta association, in collaboration with myself and Giorgia Sestilli, librarian at la Casa delle Culture [Culture's House] in Ancona.

It was a project to talk and dance and watch dance in relation to the coronavirus. Here is its website.

 

Martha Graham's choreosophy - talk

On October 12, 2019, I delivered a talk titled "La coreosofia di Martha Graham" [Martha Graham's choreosophy] at B-Nario in Montecosaro (Macerata), Italy, as part of Sostantivo femminile, a series of events and exhibitions dedicated to women artists. There were some technical problems and an unforseen delay in my talk, but I had some very intersting feed-back from the audience.
On the term 'choreosophy' I have already written about in this blog, see here and in my book on Graham's Letter to the World [the link leads to a detailed synopsis in English, but the actual book is in Italian]. I would like to thank Marco Di Pasquale who organised the event, for having invited me and for his help.

Afrofuturist Degas essay

My essay, "Afrofuturist Degas" has been published on the visual arts magazine Roots - Routes. It is an Afrofuturist analysis of Ken Browar and Deborah Ory' photographs of Misty Copeland posing as Degas's ballerinas, photographs that were published on Harper's Bazaar in 2016.
I had been wanting to write about those photographs for a long time and am very grateful to Roots - Routes for having allowed me to do that. I cover different topics throughout the essay, such as the absence (until fairly recently) of black ballerinas in ballet history, blackface and the notion of both ballet and photography as technologies. I wish I could have explored these aspects a bit further but I could not due to reasons of space.
The essay is available online here.

Presentation of Spadolini documentary

On Tuesday 27, August 2019, in the Pinacoteca in Jesi (An), I presented an evening dedicated to dancer painter Alberto Spadolini where Riccardo De Angelis and Romeo Marconi' documentary, Spadò - Il danzatore nudo (2019) was showed, followed by a chat with the directors and Spadolini's nephew, Marco Travaglini. Here is my review of the documentary.
The Pinacoteca is becoming a reference point for the rediscovery of Spadolini as, thanks to my collaboration with them (mainly thanks to Simona Cardinali) on November 10, 2012, I organised and presented another event to celebrate Spadolini, Dalla tela al palco - Vita, pittura e danza di Alberto Spadolini, which consisted in a lecture performance done in collaboration with dj Nooz and dancer and choreographer Roberto Lori, and an interview with Travaglini and sculptor Massimo Ippoliti.
In February 2017, the directors shot the video interview they made with me in the Pinacoteca as well.
I therefore thank them for their help and kindness.

Martha Graham's Letter as a dance adaptation essay

My essay, "Martha Graham's Letter to the World: A dance adaptation of Emily Dickinson" has been published last June on the Journal of Adaptation in Film & Performance, Vol 12, Ns 1-2, 1 June 2019, pp. 33-48. 
In it I analyse Graham's Letter as a dance adaptation, to show how she converted Dickinson's poetic (and not just poetic) material into dance. I also briefly focus on the notion of dance adaptation itself.

Italy and the Classics

Tomorrow I will be in Oxford to take part to the one-day conference Italy and the Classics. My paper is about dancer painter Alberto Spadolini. Here is the programme. Here more details.

Alberto Spadolini, un anconetano nel mondo

Tomorrow I will be in Ancona to deliver a brief talk on the relationship between Alberto Spadolini and dance, here an essay in Italian I wrote about it.

Adaptation and Dance Conference

Trinity House, Leicester.

Organised by the Centre of Adaptations, the Adaptation and Dance Conference, was held at Trinity House, De Montfort University, Leicester, United Kingdom, on 2 March 2016, and aimed at opening the debate on the subject. In the introductory talk, the two organisers, Elinor Parsons and Hila Shachar, noted how dance has always been dealing with adaptation and how 2016 represents a particularly fruitful year in that it marks the four hundredth anniversary of Shakespeare’s death, with the Birmingham Royal Ballet restaging of Frederick Ashton’s The Dream, based on Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream and the Northern Ballet choreographing of Charlotte Brönte’s Jane Eyre.

 
It  was cold, it rained, it also snowed and was sunny. In this respect, the English weather stood up to its reputation. Finding where the conference venue was, was not easy, but walking in Leicester was a beautiful experience and Trinity House a marvellous and very comfortable place, with nice rooms for the panels and the captivating old chapel for the opening talk and the final round table.

Conference opening.

I was in the panel on “Theorizing Adaptation & Dance”, chaired by Deborah Cartmell, which was thought-provoking and inspiring in terms of ideas and questions raised. Ramsay Burt’s paper, “Dance and Adaptation: Intermediality and Intertextuality”, focused on dance as an art form which develops across space and time in relation to other art forms, like music. He made the examples, among others, of Angelin Preljocaj’s peculiar Romeo and Juliet and Jiři Kylián’s Symphony of Psalms of which he talked of as an adaptation of Igor Stravinsky’s music, an aspect which was brought again up during the discussion. Giannandrea Poesio’s paper, “Adaptation politics: the Risorgimento model”, highlighted the profound tie between nineteenth century Italian ballo and Italian politics. Italy was struggling on various fronts, among whose was achieving unity and these aspects influenced all the arts and contributed to develop a strong political tinge in the production of dance works.

 

My paper, “This Choreotext Which is Not One: On Dance Adaptation Theory”, was on the choreotext stauts in relation to dance reconstruction and adaptation theory and the last paper, “Dancing Figures. Rhetorical Devices in Dance”, by Begoña Olabarria Smith, dealt with the relationship between rhetorical figures and dance. The debate that followed was intriguing and posed some potential challenges to the field of adaptation studies, the most notable being the possibility for a dance adaptation not to include narrative and what role does the body’s “disruptive presence” play in narrative terms.  

One of the panels.

Other panels I went to presented interesting perspectives, like the one dedicated to “Cultural & Political Contexts” or the one on “Experimental Practitioners”. In the first, Miriam Hasikova's “The influence of the Political Regime on the Ballet Production and Adaptation of the Performances during the Communism in Czechoslovakia”, brought to life a little known but remarkable reality, while in the second, Christophe Collard's “Choreographing Continuity, Dancing Stein”, highlighted the complexity of Stein's work, The Making of Americans, and Juliette Mapp's multimediatic dance adaptation with a focus more on form than content and the consequent deconstruction of binary oppositions.

The final roundtable tied together some of the questions that emerged during the panels, like the relationship between dramaturgy and choreography, the significance of reception and the crucial importance of context for any dance adaptation analysis.

A nice wine drinking followed and then, a group of us, went to the Indian restaurant Kayal to continue talking about the conference in a more relaxed atmosphere.