Constanza Macras | DorkyPark with 21 boys and girl between 5 and 22 years old from the Hillbrow Theatre Project introduce “Hillbrowfication”.
A PART OF SPACE TALES, FUTURE CITIES
Hillbrow is part of Johannesburg: a city within the city, a suburb right in the center. Originally planned as a showcase district, which provided a particularly healthy living situation for the residents, it became synonymous with corruption, violence and poverty with its decline during the 1990s. Thanks to the initiative of many neighborhood organizations, spaces like the Hillbrow Theatre offer a haven of relative peace and safety for kids and youths, promoting a progressive environment for the integration of the neighbourhood’s inhabitants of various origins in a context still charged with criminality and xenophobic violence. Choreographer Constanza Macras, is now bringing her international production to the Festival 10 Sentidos. Twenty-one Hillbrow children aged 5 to 19 have worked in Johannesburg with her and with choreographer Lisi Estarás on a futuristic approach to their life in a neighborhood. An alien invasion that establishes a new social order based on people’s dance skills. A revolutionary princess with infinite names who is able to bend the corridors of space and time. People who develop the capacity to rebound from the ground to deal with broken elevators… These and other stories inhabit strange worlds of possible futures and unlikely ones in Hillbrowfication. Between utopias and dystopias of ghettoisation and gentrification, the fictional future histories of Hillbrow, of its cultures and beings, create a universe where the performers negotiate and subvert self- representational narratives and their perceptions of xenophobia and violence in the city.
“We done let the poetic spirit in folk languish, like bein’ human mean togglin’ a damn switch steada imaginin’ yourself’ cross spacetime and back. Check me on that, all right?” Andrea Hairstone, Mindscape.
CONSTANZA MACRAS was born in Buenos Aires, Argentina, where she studied Dance and Fashion Design at the University of Buenos Aires. From there she continued her studies as dancer in Amsterdam and New York (Merce Cunningham Studios). In 1995,Macras moves to Berlin to dance with different companies. In 1997 she established her first own company called TAMAGOTCHI Y2K with which she presented 4 pieces between 1998 and 2000.
DORKY PARK was created in 2003 under the artistic management of Constanza Macras and Carmen Mehnert in dramaturgy. It is an interdisciplinary company which works with dance, text, live music and video.
From its foundation, Constanza Macrashas created more than 20 spectacles which have toured all around the world. Presenting in festivals as in Festival of Avignon in France, Wiener Festwochen in Austria, Seoul Performing Arts Festival (SPAF) in Korea; Festival Internacional de Buenos Aires (FIBA) in Argentina, Attakalari – India Biennial in India or Dance Umbrella Johannesburg.
Idea and Stage Management: Constanza Macras
Choreography: Constanza Macras and Lisi Estarás
Dramaturgy: Tamara Saphir
Performers: Miki Shoji, Emil Bordas, John Sithole
From Hillbrow Theatre Project: Zibusiso Dube, Bigboy Ndlovu, Nompilo Hadebe, Rendani Dlamini, Karabo Kgatle, Tshepang Lebelo, Brandon Magengele, Jackson Magotlane, Bongani Mangena, Tisetso Maselo, Vusi Magoro, Amahle Meine, Sakhile Mlalazi, Sandile Mthembu, Hope Mwenda, Ndlovu, Simiso Ngubane, Blessing Opoka, Pearl Sigwagwa, Ukho Somadlaka and Lwadlile Thabethe.
Wardrobe: Roman Handt
Lighting/Illumination: Sergio de Carvalho Pessanha
Stage Space Design: Roman Handt with the collaboration of Boitumelo Project
Director’s assistant: Helena Casas and Linda Michael Mkhwanazi
Distribution and Production: DorkyPark
Company Web: http://www.dorkypark.org/
Social Networks of the company:
http://www.facebook.com/Constanza-MacrasDOrkyPark-156517191369766/
