Re – enactment / MicroDances Athens

Phase two of An Ideal City, to be presented on 17 June 2022 at the Agricultural University of Athens, places particular emphasis on the project’s educational aspects, and on the potential for works of art to be performed transpositionally across time and space. An Ideal City –a project launched in October 2020 and set to conclude in July 2022– seeks to investigate and explore dance’s potential as a form of public art rooted in the urban fabric of three cities: Athens, Reggio Emilia, and Brussels. Springing from the partnership of three European dance institutions –Fondazione Nazionale della Danza / Aterballetto (Reggio Emilia), Les Halles de Schaerbeek (Brussels), and the Greek National Opera Ballet (Athens)– the project is co-funded by the Creative Europe programme of the European Union, established to provide support for the cultural and creative sectors.

Phase one of An Ideal City saw the creation and presentation of 21 MicroDances – short dance pieces (lasting between six and ten minutes each and designed for up to three dancers, to be performed in small spaces), commissioned from artists with highly different backgrounds and influences.

In this first phase, works created by eight Greek and 13 international choreographers were organically developed in relation to select cultural / museum spaces across the three cities; in the project’s second phase, these works are to be re-enacted in public spaces that vary from city to city, and performed by very young dancers / dance students who have taken part in specific workshops for this purpose. In Athens, phase one of the project was presented in October 2021, with a five-hour route taking in 21 stops spread across four host venues: the Acropolis Museum, the National Museum of Contemporary Art Athens (EMST), the Stavros Niarchos Foundation Cultural Center (SNFCC), and the Greek National Opera.

For phase two of the project, eight choreographies have been selected to be presented in open-air spaces across Athens, Brussels, and Reggio Emilia. In Athens, the works are to be performed in various areas at the campus of the Agricultural University of Athens (AUA), an historic academic institution that has, for more than a century now, formed a lively part of Athens’ urban corpus, not to mention a vital centre for the study of agriculture and livestock farming, the climate crisis, and various environmental problems and solutions that are currently emerging with unprecedented urgency. The long history of the AUA, the contributions it has made, the role it has played in the study of primary production, and its presence in the heart of Athens’ urban fabric –both in relation to ancient city arteries, and to contemporary industrial structures– make it an ideal platform for the narrative being ventured by the project that is An Ideal City: namely, the potential inherent in the human body for recounting social change and urban transformation, and for inspiring sympoetic manifestations of our movement through the world.

An Ideal City falls under the joint artistic direction of Gigi Cristoforetti (Fondazione Nazionale della Danza / Aterballetto), Christophe Galent (Les Halles de Schaerbeek), and Konstantinos Rigos (the Greek National Opera Ballet).

The Scientific Committee of An Ideal City comprises three curators involved in the project’s overall developmental design, its interdisciplinary aspects, and its various urban applications and structural transformations across both phases of its implementation. The curators are: Costanza Meli in Reggio Emilia (for Fondazione Nazionale della Danza / Aterballetto), Pauline de La Boulaye in Brussels (for Les Halles de Schaerbeek), and Nadja Argyropoulou in Athens (for the Greek National Opera Ballet).

Event programme

01 – Strôma (in front of the Central Administration Building)

Choreography: Giovanni Insaudo

Music: BFRND, “La vie en rose”

With: Agnese Biavati, Marek Brafa Misicoro

02 – Knight Rider (inside the Central Administration Building Main Hall)

Choreography: Yannis Nikolaidis

Original music: Manolis Manousakis

With: Ilia Koukouzeli

03 – Fantasmagoria (square in front of the Evelpides Building)

Choreography: Markella Manoliadi

Music: Gabriel Fauré, “Après un rêve”

Mezzo-soprano: Martha Sotiriou

With: Despoina Chrysostomou

04 – Forget Me Not (Floriculture Garden)

Choreography: Konstantinos Rigos

Music: Giorgos Koumendakis

Saxophone: Anna Maria Kardami

With: Pavlos Orfeas Argyropoulos

05 – Pensieri di carta (Floriculture Garden – New Greenhouse)

Choreography, original music: Hélias Tur-Dorvault

With: Despoina Karakatsani

06 – Turn the Tide (behind the Ornamental Plants Greenhouse)

Choreography: Roberto Tedesco

Music: BowLand

With: Theoni Peraki, Spyros Zikos

07 – Active Motivation (Arboriculture Garden – Open-air Cinema)

Choreography: Elena Kekkou

Music: Antonis Vlachos

With: Konstantina Tsimeka

08 – Eppur si muove (Old Arboretum entrance)

Choreography: Francesca Lattuada

Music: Ludwig van Beethoven

Costume design: Bruno Fatalot

With: Marios Athanasios Bozikas