4 Steps 4 Angel
A query sui generis from William Shakespeare’s Sonnets
Charlotte Zerbey
May 7, 2016 19:30
Stazione Leopolda di Firenze | IT
Also on
May 8, 2016 19:30
A perceptive performance
an adaptation of the new creation Angel
Angel is a female trio inspired by the Fair Youth, a key figure in many of William Shakespeare’s Sonnets.
The choreography jostles the idea of transformation freely playing with movement between identities, parts, roles, values and gender.
The beautiful Fair Youth in Shakespeare’s Sonnets is the subject/object of an “inspired and profound” love, transpiring its indecipherable quality. This essence is similar to that of Grace, pleasant yet fleeting.
Here, this sensual quality reflects bright and clear in the scenic action, yet also strikes into somewhat perturbing shadows. “Master mistress of my passion”, this figure is the appeasement, which rules at the center of all conflict, “Till my bad angel fire my good one out”.
Thus the Fair Youth adjourns to an archetype of great charm, a higher being, androgynous, longed for and desired by both genders, “Which steals men’s eyes and women’s souls amazeth”.
It’s a battlefield of primordial rights, of insinuating prejudices and hypocrisies, a topic also present in the Elizabethan age, when young male actors portrayed feminine characters.
It’s an ethical and cultural topic, which is also object of current and broad debate.
The music for Angel is specifically composed for the piece putting to music Shakespeare’s Sonnets in an adaption into song and verse, touching on different genres of melody, Beat, Rap and poetic verse creating an original soundscape that intertwines storytelling with the mystery of poetics.
Choreographer, dancer, vocalist, Charlotte Zerbey has been active for over 25 years in contemporary dance in Italy, Europe and the United States. After obtaining a traditional education in modern and classical dance at the University of Utah, in 1983 she moved to Europe where she initially worked with the company Group / O Katie Duck (I), then collaborated with Gaby Agus, Company Hamilton and Parco Butterfly
In 1994 she worked in Twenty to Eight – Travelogue I, with Sasha Waltz and Guests, replicated extensively in Europe and the United States from 1993-2001, brought back in 2008 in and in 2009 in Paris. In 1989, together with Alessandro Certini, she founded Company Blu where is co-director and choreographer.
Rewarded Danza & Danza in 2000 for the choreography, Tempesta di Sogni, produced by Armunia Festival Castiglioncello, she has been present at international festivals such as Rotterdam Festival, Dance Umbrella London, Festival De Dansa Post Modern Caracas, Festival / D Werf in Utrecht, New York Improvisation Festival, L’Animal al’Esquegna Girona, The Naked Stage Lujbjana, Tanz Tage Freiburg, Sic Festival Warsaw, ID Fest. Los Angeles, Radial System Berlin.
Over the last 25 years Zerbey’s dance work has transformed into a multidisciplinary expression of dance and textual movement that uses song, poetry, oldies, rant. She often works in concert with musicians and originally composed scores and with meaning as it is communicated through gesture and text. Her performance language is influenced by an interest in the emancipation of the body through studies in vocal work, Contact Improvisation, Authentic Movement, and Traditional Chinese Massage. Interest in also presenting gender related work began in 1998 with the work Silenzi, inspired by Emily Dickenson’s poetry.
Other collaborations have included improvisational projects along side dancers: K. Duck, A. Certini, S. Paxton, P. DeGroot, J. Hamilton, K. Simson, N. S. Smith, A. Alessi, L. Nelson.
In 2011 taught for Sasha Waltz and Guests and is an annual guest with workshops and performance projects at (Radialsystem V, Berlin).
