En–Knap & Simone Sandroni, Lenka Flory

In Between

45 min

#en–knap group's repertoire#co-productions

2007

This high-energy performance, set to an original score by Luigi Ceccarelli and Gaetan van den Berg, is composed of two contrasting yet complementary parts: Earth and Sky. Created by renowned choreographers Simone Sandroni and Lenka Flory, the work examines the fragile distance between who we are and who we imagine ourselves to be. Its characters search for happiness, belonging and meaning, yet repeatedly find themselves caught in cycles of desire, rivalry, fear and solitude. Moving between the earthly and the aspirational, the performance reveals the tensions that shape both individual lives and collective experience.

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Small and limited place. To get their place and position people suspect, seduce, dominate and loose, struggle, envy and fight. They look to the sky and think of happiness. "One day we will discover that we are not ourselves, but instead someone else who we really ought to be. One day we will dare to bare ourselves and with irony look at the figure that we used to call "me" - to laugh at its power, its confidence and truth, its crude naiveté. Earth is a battle, complete with vice, egoism, and privat aggression. It is like a medieval farce - fights, sex, and no mercy. No positive characters. In these situations, the bizarre narcissistic figures we watch are fuelled by lust and the desire for attention. In unspoken bitter hope the moral paradox of our bodies is revealed - our bodies are the proverbial vessels of sin, and yet in their naked and vulnerable they are the image of innocence.

Lenka Flory, on Earth

Vast and borderless sky. People search for each other to avoid solitude. Finding each other they suspect, seduce, dominate and loose, struggle, envy and fight. They look back to the Earth and think of lost happiness. "Instead of flying we dug into the cold earth. We continued to fall, believing that the impact with the earth would allow us to penetrate it and understand it. In an impulse to obtain justice we sought the guilty, and found them stamped on the mirror of our conscience, small, without experience and scared. These were the ones we listened to and obeyed when they ordered us not to live but to do, not to listen but to speak, to protect ourselves with armour made of I MYSELF, the hardest, most futile material, just right to protect us against insecurity. The cold took us by surprise, in the dark we didn`t recognise each other anymore and became enemies. We began to strike ourselves with the strength of fear, of panic, and the blades of indifference." We were already there, but we searched for ourselves elsewhere.

Simone Sandroni, on Sky

bio

From '87 to '92, Simone Sandroni was a member of the Ultima Vez company. He danced in 5 performances and 2 video productions (including the award winning La Mentira and Roseland) by Wim Vandekeybus. As a choreographer Sandroni created 6 pieces, including See Me and Suffer, which was produced in collaboration with the Slovene choreographer Branko Potočan.

The Czech choreographer, dancer and teacher Lenka Flory collaborated in the 'Eighties with several German contemporary dance companies. In '91 she joined the internationally acclaimed Ultima Vez (chor. Wim Vandekeybus). She returned to her hometown of Prague to establish, with her mother Eva Blažičkova, the first Czech school for contemporary dance, The Duncan Centre Conservatory. In 1992 the school was officially recognised by the Ministry of Education. A year later Flory founded the dance company of the Duncan Centre. She invited the Italian dancer/choreographer, Simone Sandroni, to join the company as artistic collaborator. Already with her first choreographies 7.35 and ...And where is Mary she aroused undivided sympathy among Czech critics and audience. Soon after, her choreographies were hosted by theatres abroad (UK, Germany, Belgium, USA, Poland, Italy,...). In '96, Flory choreographed Live and Let Live in North Carolina, which was commissioned by the American Dance Festival.

credits

Concept and choreography Lenka Flory (Earth), Simone Sandroni (Sky)

Created and performed by En–KnapGroup Luke Dunne, Katja Legin, Tomáš Nepšinský, Ana Štefanec, Ilkem Ulugün

Executive producer Tina Dobnik

Music Luigi Ceccarelli, Gaetan van den Berg

Sound Raffaele Petrucci

Light design Anže Kreč

Set design Simone Sandroni, Lenka Flory

Costume design Lavinia Cascone

Technical manager Anže Kreč

Sound engineer Matej Ocepek

Graphic design Novi Kolektivizem

Program writers Lenka Flory, Simone Sandroni

Photography Simone Sandroni, En–Knap Archive

Translations Katja Veber

Production En–Knap Productions

Co-production Deja Donne

Partner Bunker, Stara mestna elektrarna - Elektro Ljubljana

Thanks to Stojan Pelko, Iztok Kovač, Miran Mohar, Darko Pokorn, Ervin Markošek, Tomaž Gorišek, Ana Rici, Marjana Tepina, Giulia Sandroni

With support: Ministry of Culture of the Republic of Slovenia, Municipality of Ljubljana - Department for Culture