MITbr - PLATAFORMA BRASIL
Conexões Centro-Oeste
Silly Dance
Dança Boba
ARTIST: Ateliê do Gesto
50 min | All ages
- March 12 and 13, Thursday and Friday, 7 PM
- Itaú Cultural | Avenida Paulista, 149, Bela Vista
- Accessible location
- The session on 12 March includes audio description
- Sessions with interpretation in Brazilian Sign Language (Libras)
- There is use of strobe lights
SYNOPSIS
Performed by the duo of dancers and choreographers Daniel Calvet and João Paulo Gross, the piece is grounded in the creation of dances through improvisational games. The choreographies emerge from simplicity and the performers’ poetic invention, with gestures shaped by presence and the physicality of their bodies. In this profusion of images and meanings, the work moves through memory, nostalgia, lightness, dramatic tension, and playfulness. Metaphors arise around a possible story the duo may wish to tell here and now.
BACKGROUND
Ateliê do Gesto is a contemporary dance creation platform based in Goiânia, Goiás, dedicated for the past 11 years to research on the body and its poetic, political, and sensorial unfoldings. Under the artistic direction of Daniel Calvet and João Paulo Gross, the group develops works that investigate presence, gesture, and imagination, understanding the body as a territory of relation, listening, and alterity. The company’s creations stem from collaborative processes and improvisational practices, grounded in ethical and aesthetic principles centered on encounters between performers, audiences, and contexts. In addition to performances, the collective also carries out educational projects in Brazil and abroad, connecting dance, movement dramaturgy, and critical thinking in dialogue with place.
CRITICAL RECEPTION
“Far from being ‘silly,’ the work reflects on time and the ephemeral nature of gestures, composing a staging full of metaphors and meanings.”
Nathalie Yokel, La Terrasse
“Unpretentious and good-humored, the performance leans into comedy. Loaded with lights, effects, and music, it places the dancers in situations that quickly shift from the everyday to the peculiar, insisting that sometimes all one can do is dance. Not to solve the world with choreography, but to deal with life. Not a serious, sober dance. A silly dance, full of the pleasure of dancing.”
Henrique Rochelle, Outra Dança
CREDITS
General Direction: Daniel Calvet
Creation and Research: Gleysson Moreira, Daniel Calvet
Performers: Daniel Calvet, João Paulo Gross
Costume Design: Marílio Cabrita
Lighting, Set Design, and Projection: Daniel Calvet
Lighting Technician, Installation, and Operation: Roosevelt Saavedra
Photography: Lu Barcelos (Chocolate Fotografias)
Executive Producer: Marci Dornelas (Lúdica Eventos e Projetos Culturais)
General Production: João Paulo Gross (Ateliê do Gesto Creative Platform)