Meditation on Beauty

by Marina Giovannini

3-4 October
at 19:30

 

first floor B9 – Manifattura Tabacchi

 

HAPPENING! Festival

Conceived and curated by Letizia Renzini.

Created and produced by NAM – Not A Museum.

full program

INSTALLATION
25 September – 1 October 2020, from 18:00-23:00 (last entry 22:15). Sunday 27/09 from 13:00.

TRIAL SESSIONS
29 September-2 October, from 18:00-20:00.

Meditations #1 #2 #3 / SHARING TRAININGS
Friday 25, Saturday 26 and Sunday 27 September at 18:00-19:30.

 

Happening! / Meditation on Beauty + Sharing Trainings

Meditation on Beauty is a project by Marina Giovannini that is inspired by her fascination for geometry as a means to measure space and provide the basis to construct arduous exercises in balance: held movements and poses which require a total trust in one’s own body and its partner’s steadiness. Space and Time are the cartesian axes of dance, here articulated by the body from a female viewpoint in constant and circular mutability. Stances that are both fragile and resolute are expressed in firm yet quickly released poses. Meditation on Beauty is a metaphor for a world that is in search of a temporary, yet solid equilibrium, where change is necessary and articulated as a constant challenge to one’s own position which in turn evolves into yet another quest and reflection on the very existence of the feminine in its identity’s manifestation as a woman, a dancer, a person so that the very idea of femininity — its fragility and its power— relates to beauty and affirms the need for gracefulness and a quest for harmony.

Choreography: Marina Giovannini
With: Marta Capaccioli, Veronica Cornacchini, Marina Giovannini, Lucrezia Palandri
Music: Nina Simone
Production: CAB008

Project realized with the contribution of Fondazione CR Firenze.

This installation is produced in collaboration with the makers of B9: mòno, Canificio and Duccio Maria Gambi.

 

Meditations #1 #2 #3 / Sharing Trainings

 

Access will be in full compliance with the measures that the Italian government is taking to combat the spread of COVID-19.

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Choreographer and dancer Marina Giovannini was classically trained and worked for many years with the Virgilio Sieni dance company where she developed a new language of contemporary dance. Giovannini’s personal research evolved over time towards a study of destruction and re-composition of classical gestures into an expansive agglomeration of bodies in which measuring and occupying space and its objects by using the body are cardinal points of Marina’s expressive language. These are synthesised and explored in the modular project entitled Meditation on Beauty.

 

PROVE APERTE
Meditation on Beauty

 

29 September-2 October, from 18:00-20:00.
Marina Giovannini with Marta Capaccioli, Veronica Cornacchini and Lucrezia Palandri.

MEDITATIONS #1, #2, #3
/ SHARING TRAININGS

 

Friday 25, Saturday 26 and Sunday 27 September, at 18:00.

 

Led by Marina Giovannini 

Props made by mòno, Canificio and Duccio Maria Gambi.

 

During the installation, from 18:00 to 19:30 on 25, 26, and 27 September, there will be three Sharing Training Sessions with Attivisti della Danza, specifically created for Happening! and guided by Marina Giovannini who will lead a project centred on cardinal shapes and creative trajectories intrinsic to the choreography of her show Meditation on Beauty. The audience will be able to watch movements, repetitions, and practices, while exploring the B9 space and its other installations.

 

Marina Giovannini’s Meditation on Beauty evolves and expands in the spaces of Manifattura Tabacchi: it sheds its preconceived format and transforms itself into a show that is both inclusive and interactive as a Sharing Training session, in collaboration with Attivisti della Danza. The scene is composed of modular plinths custom-made by mòno, Canificio and Duccio Maria Gambi. Thanks to their ability to be combined in multiple ways, the plinths create a space in continuous change as performers and visitors interact with them, giving life to a collective, interdisciplinary experience.

 

Sharing Training is a way of teaching that is mutual and shared which provides an exchange of talents that turns into an ethical stance. Sharing Training reflects the concept of creation and solidarity of the Florentine collective Attivisti della Danza.

 

 

To participate as a performer

 

The workshop is designed specifically for dancers and performers with previous experience in movement and dance.

A maximum of 10 participants will be admitted per day.

 

To participate, it is necessary to reserve a space by writing to: info@dancefordance.net.

MARINA GIOVANNINI

Dancer and choreographer, interested in the body’s expressive potential and interaction
with the various languages of art, she collaborates with dancers, choreographers and
artists and concentrates on her personal research towards a language favouring the
naturalness of gesture. She is interested in the new languages of Italian contemporary
dance, starting her long experience in the Compagnia Virgilio Sieni, where she was
assistant choreographer, main interpreter of all the productions and artistic collaborator
from 1993 to 2006. In 2008 she won the Equilibrio Award by Fondazione Musica per
Roma. In 2003 she started collaborating with Letizia Renzini, discovering more new
multimedia languages. Her work extends through very different artistic contexts, using her
long experience in shows and performances for festivals, theatres, museums, art galleries,
cinema sets and urban spaces.

 

ATTIVISTI DELLA DANZA

Attivisti della Danza is an open group of dancers and choreographers based in Florence and the surrounding areas. Since 2012, the collective has opened an active dialogue on the needs of professional dancers working in Italy. Attivisti della Danza promotes Sharing Training, a horizontal way of sharing bodily practice, geared towards providing meetings between professional dancers over time. Sharing Training sessions are led by participants in rotation thanks to the idea of a circular economy. Its goal is to open a communal and interdisciplinary space which reflects the hybrid borders between contemporary practices of dance, movement, and the body. www.dancefordance.net

 

MARTA CAPACCIOLI 

Marta Capaccioli graduated from the Codarts-Rotterdam Dance Academy in 2007. She worked for MCdance Meyer/Chaffaud, Aida Redza, Paolo Poli, Virgilio Sieni, Marina Giovannini, Daniele Ninarello, Fabrizio Favale/Le Supplici, Micha van Hoecke, Anja Gysin, Dagada Dance Company, Cristina Kristal Rizzo, Annamaria Ajmone, Kinkaleri, Jonathan Burrows and Matteo Fargion, and Lara Barsacq. In 2018-19, Capaccioli was one of the dancers selected and trained by Marina Abramović and Lynsey Peisinger for the Marina Abramović/The Cleaner retrospective in which she was interpreter in six re-performances of the artist. As a dancer, Capaccioli is an active member of research and creation groups such as Stabile di Lì and Karolin Stächele/Yannis Karalis. Since 2014, she also researched and wrote about new forms of coexistence and creative development. Capaccioli is a certified Iyengar Yoga teacher. Parallel to her activity as a dancer, Marta channels her creative energy through drawing. She currently resides in Paris.

 

VERONICA CORNACCHINI 

Veronica Cornacchini is a designer and performer. She graduated with a degree in Design from the University of Industrial Design in Florence and concluding her studies at the TU(s) of Eindhoven where she researched Wearable Technology. As a dancer, Cornacchini has worked with Yuval Pick, Compagnia Zappalà Danza, Helge Letonja, and Marina Giovannini. In 2009, she participated in the Arsenale della Danza project directed by Ismael Ivo at the Venice Dance Biennale. Recently, Cornacchini’s passions for design and dance converged when she began working on set and costume design. As of 2011, Cornacchini is co-founder and designer at SuperDuper Hats, the internationally renowned hat brand which won the Who’s on next award organized by Vogue Italia in 2013.

 

LUCREZIA PALANDRI

Lucrezia Palandri is a dancer and performer. During her training, she integrated different techniques with the study of somatic practices. Palandri has worked throughout Europe and the United States with artists such as Marina Abramović, Jonathan Burrows and Matteo Fargion, Simone Forti, Marina Giovannini, Dewey Dell, Paolo Poli, Letizia Renzini, Luisa Cortesi, Fosca, Kim Epifano, Willi Dorner, Cristina Rizzo, and Annamaria Ajmone. Since 2012, Palandri has been developing a personal language as an author and plays an active role in various research and creative groups such as Stabile di Lì and David and the dreamers, in which she supports the dance profession together with other dance activists. In 2013, Palandri co-founded the Spichisi association in Pistoia. The Spichisi association promotes artistic and cultural initiatives through urban regeneration projects. Palandri has a doctorate in Art and Law from the University of Florence, where she continues to collaborate as a postdoctoral researcher.