Roberta Racis
ATTO BIANCO
September 18, 2024 21:00
Teatro Cantiere Florida di Firenze | IT
as part of Fabbrica Europa 2024
Atto Bianco inaugurates a trilogy on the theme of roots and family heritage. The colour white evokes conceptual refractions that Roberta Racis has drawn on for this work in which dance, voice and song structure the action.
Atto Bianco calls into question a visual, sound and choreographic universe with sharp but open contours, a texture that is the result of the layering of all the instruments at the choreographer’s disposal. Embodying the ambiguity between performance and representation, Roberta Racis is endowed with a technique that challenges formal balances without overwhelming the sensitive substance.
Atto Bianco has a minimal aesthetic, but tumultuous elements can be found in its textures, creating what could be perceived as a friction between a warm inner dimension and an outer, candid and linear one. The author relies more on inner ripples than on her outer body. These are not emotional fractures, but veins that allow the dance to deepen in duration.
Roberta Racis composes a homage to the maternal that is also a study of the white act of romantic ballet. The scene strewn with leaves is a reminder of a nature that is both a friend of the body and a remnant of a world (or something, or someone) that is no more. The white act is generally the second act of plays whose libretto narrates events straddling the world of the living and an otherworldly dimension. These are acts in which, after the death of a character, usually female, the afterlife manifests itself. A world, white and magical, that unifies space and time. The corps de ballet, in white tutus, outlines virtuosity in geometric formations while the soloists dance intertwining steps to emphasize the ‘fatal’ superiority of those same bodies. Precursor of an objectification of bodies, the white act is predisposed, today, to an investigation such as that of Roberta Racis, who reflects on the feminine by deflagrating the personal exploration of fragility and mourning in a broader series of possibilities.
Atto Bianco finally evokes a homecoming that manifests itself with a scene change. The dancer poses and rests, suspended. The action is ready for her to dissolve, in the device itself, that pain that has accompanied her throughout her journey, from the conception of the project to the stage.
