Choreographer Iris Erez made me pause at the Israeli Museum this month when she suggested that a room full of international visitors take selfies and place their phones on the ground, out of reach. Viewers peered down to find their reflections in a mosaic of black mirrors following Iris’ 30-minute-long solo, Self Ritual, presented by Machol Shalem Dance House’s Jerusalem International Dance Week, which hosts top curators and theater programmers from around the globe for five days of dance performances around the city.
As a performance artist whose works tend to associate with theater, I find that the performances that I love most are actually dance. I took a moment to wonder why and found three excellent reasons. Here they are:
Noa Shavit’s solo performance, Ingiven, shows a silently screaming mouth move above a sinewy body to Nick Cave’s stirring lyric, “The tree don’t care what the little bird sings.” If Shavit is that little bird, are we the tree? How many little birds fly around us that we fail to hear? There is a certain silence occupyingRead more
Pain of the Soul Ingiven – Noa Shavit Be in the pain Be the pain Explore the pain Let it out I know I did Thank You Noa Pain of Live Tissue Work of Flesh: Soundtrack for Five Slammed Bodies – Annabelle Dvir Flash The moment the flesh hit the ground Hoo Aaaa ChiiiRead more
Google search “media influence on art” and you will primarily find articles on how Instagram has transformed the visual art market and how incredible it is that a smalltown girl in Idaho can virtually visit the Louvre. Few articles cover a question that I found hard to ignore over the past few days at Machol Shalem’s International Dance Week in Jerusalem: how does mass media and new technology influence our own creation processes and conceptions, specifically dance-making?
And here, from within a medium, drowsy egg
Peeks out a work that is a true pearl.
The song of human meat, pounded into the floor
And from the pain and the impact
Emerges a beautiful, delightful poem.
Hand Head Heart
If you break one
The continuation and movement become important
Careful, I’m about to explode.Read more
Warning: in the text before you I will mention nudity.
Partial nudity. Maybe just hinted?
Frontal nudity,
By no means anality!
Short nudity but oh so dangerous
Female nudity will be on the premises.Read more
Tomorrow we kick off our writing exploration at Machol Shalem Dance House’s Jerusalem International Dance Week. Stay tuned for our two cents on a lot of dance. Read more
Dear Moshe Kahlon,
My name is Ofra Idel. I am a choreographer and the Director of Machol Shalem Dance House in Jerusalem. These very days, you have the opportunity to prevent the Cultural Loyalty Bill, which will most probably lead to irreversible damage to the Israeli cultural world. With great ease, the Minister of Culture will be able to block artists and organizations who do their honest craft under difficult conditions for the benefit of Israeli citizens. Read more