Choreographer
“Amadeus”
From Peter Shaffer / German from Nina Adler Volkstheater Rostock (Artistic directors Keith Chin, Daniele Varallo, Laura Witzleben) Premiere 18.01.2025 - Interdisciplinary Project
Dancers: Almog Adler, Alan González Bravo, Norikazu Aoki, Florin Stocker, Maja Kowalic, Ron Estrea Kaslasy, Corinne Kälin, Gianmaria Girotto, Martina Martin
Music: Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Antonio Salieri, Eduardo Browne Salinas
Musical director: Eduardo Browne Salinas Director play: Daniel Pfluger Stage set designer: Martin Fisher Costumes designer: Claudia Charlotte Burchard Choreographer: Alessandra La Bella Choreographic Assistents: Keith Chin, Francesca Ciaffoni Dramaturgs: Arne Bloch, Stephan Knies
“Fall asleep, my child”
Premiere: Landesbühnen Sachsen (Artistic director Natalie Wagner) Premiere 25.11.2023, Guest performance Stadttheater Gießen 08.02.2024
Dancers: Lorenzo Giovanetti/Christian Senatore, Anja Neukomm/Emma Jankovič, Gavin Law/Igor Prandi
Music: Radiohead “Everything in its right place”, Thom Yorke “Hearing damage” “Dawn Chorus”, Pink Floyd “Breathe (In the Air)”
Dramaturgy: Gisela Zürner Music editing: Jesse Callaert Set and Costume designer: Greta Wilhelm Photographer: Julius Zimmermann
“Death is great.
We are his
laughing mouth.
When we mean ourselves in the midst of life
he dares to weep
in the midst of us."
-Rainer Maria Rilke
This work is an attempt to talk about the topic of death, without concentrating on the straggle and the suffering, but rather on the journey to learn how to surrender, how to give in. One can fight a lot of ghosts during a life, but mastering the feeling of falling, accepting one’s faith, is where real strength hides. “Fall asleep, my child” is meant as a work of passage, a transition from the fear of dying, from holding on to life, to facing the process of liberation, transformation and freedom. It’s a chance, a possibility to leave this dimension, to allow our spirt and our soul to continue the journey somewhere else. Life is a circle, nothing really dies, we simply become something else, something new. We become infinite.
“Swan song”
Dancer: Pablo von Sternenfels / Sandra Bourdais
Music: Female Capercaillie Bird Calling-Sound Ideas ; Black star and Lazarus-David Bowie
Developed at LOT Theater Braunschweig, September 2023 and Alte Feuerwache e.V. Berlin, August 2024
Media: Olaf Kollmannsperger
Invited at “Internationaler Choreografie Wettbewerb” Landestheater Detmold, 2024; Festival Girona en Moviment, Spain 2024.
"In tears she poured out words with a faint voice, lamenting her sad woe, as when the swan about to die sings a funeral dirge" Ovid
Swan song is a metaphorical phrase for a final gesture, effort or performance given just before death or retirement; as this refers to an ancient belief that swans sing a beautiful song just before they die, as have been silent for most of their lifetime. This work is meant as a self reflection, a moment of fear before the end, but most of all is meant as a celebration of life, a last dance before a passage to a new dimension.
“Nostos, the Myth of the return”
Premiere: Mecklenburgisches Staatstheater (Artistic director Xenia Wiest) Premiere 03.03.2023
Dancers: Margaux Pages, Honoka Mizuno/Eleonora Peperoni, Stefano Pietragalla Otavio Portela/Jonah Delgado, Benjamin Wilson, Anna Korostelova
Music: Doina, La Sciee Doree, Rosa Balistreri, Goran Bregović, Ghazal Shakeri
Assistent/Ballet Master: Jonathan dos Santos
Trailer: Olaf Kollmannsperger
Photographer: Reiner Nicklas
“Nostos, The Myth of the Return” is a celebration of a voyage, a journey that takes us back to what used to be, to the birthplace that made us “us”.
Nostos, from greek “journey, travel”, is considered to be the origin of our term “nostalgia”: connecting to a sense of exile and absence, this piece will focus on expressing the common and shared feeling on nostalgia, on the desire to return to one’s homeland, which is symbolically a return to the past, and on the vulnerability that emerges during that process.
“Tale of us”
Dancers: Rosario Guerra, Davide Sioni
Co-Choreographed with: Rosario Guerra, Alessio Marchini, Beatrice Panero
Premiere: Teatro Bellini, Napoli 2023
Co-produced by Teatro Bellini, Napoli
Composer: Jesse Callaert
Trailer: Alessio Marchini
Photographer: Lilit Hakobyan
In life’s market, one can never know who you might meet… sometimes you lose someone, other times you find someone. What matters is to always keep an open heart.
“A study on falling”
Dancers: Aya Misaki, Francesca Ciaffoni, Francisco Banos Diaz, Pablo von Sternenfels
Music: Patti Smith, Radiohead, Thom Yorke
Developed at Residenzzentrum tanz+ Baden, Switzerland, 2022
Trailer and Photo: David Lagerqvist
“A study on falling” is an internal journey into the concept of falling, on a physical and intellectual level. Is an elaboration on the origin of the linguistic meaning, and of the experience of the body. Falling in, falling out, falling behind, falling apart. These are only few of the English terms used to explain a large range of events in our life that often shape the very core of who we are. What are our pre-concepts or fears behind the idea of falling? Why are we so desperately uncomfortable with the idea of losing balance? Can we “organize” falling? Losing balance is a necessary part of finding balance. Falling is essential any time we decide to try for something. It means we are alive, we are in motion, we vibrate.
“Wu-Wei:The Art of not forcing”
Dancers: Sandra Bourdais, Francisco Banos Diaz, Conal Francis-Martin
Premiere: “All you can dance”, Staatstheater Hannover, 2022
Music: Erik Enocksson
Music Editing: Jesse Callaert
Trailer: Robert Robinson
Photographer: Heike Mischewsky
Text inspired by words from Alan Watts
“Wu Wei-The art of not forcing” is a celebration of freedom, honesty and presence. Is a deepening of what it truly feels to find authenticity in one self, and to nourish the curiosity that hides behind all pre-concepts and structures. Because you have to be able to realize and accept that you don’t not know what you really want to do... until you’re very quiet.
“Push the sky away”
Dancer: Francisco Banos Diaz
Premiere: “All you can dance”, Staatstheater Hannover, 2020
Music: Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds
Photographer: Dor Pazuelo
Invited at the “Corpi in Fuga” Dance Gala 2022 (Teatro Rossetti Trieste, Italy) Jerusalem International Solo Dance Festival, 2022; Premio Internazionale Prospettiva Danza Teatro 2023 - XIV Edizione (Pre-selection, Rome)
We all have the feeling of the world folding in on us: we try desperately to find the right door that will lead us to a sacred place where we can be our true selfs. At the end of the day it seems impossible to lay in bed when there is still so much left to feel. Maybe it is impossible to push the sky away, but we need to try because our journey is not about the active rage against the dying of the light, it's about the shifting resistance of water and wind.
“A silver distance”
Dancers: Mikaela Kelly, Jesse Callaert
Independent Project, 2022
Trailer: Lilit Hakobyan
Music: Tommaso Bucciero, Asaf Avidan
Music editing: Jesse Callaert
There is a sense of closeness and separation we are bound to feel when we embark on an emotional journey with another human being. How close can we really get to our loved ones? How deep can we go, and, inevitably, for how long will we remain strangers? " A silver distance" is about an invisible line that persists between two people, a line that keeps them apart despite the love, years, habits and routine. A line that will never allow us to be one, but rather "alone-together".
“A quiet thriller”, a short film
Dancers: Louis Steinmetz, Francisco Banos Diaz, Marta Cerioli
Premiere: “All you can dance” Staatstheater Hannover, 2021
Music: Erik Satie
Camera and editing: Philipp Contag-Lada
Trailer: Philipp Contag-Lada
Special thanks to Neues Rathaus Hannover and Staatstheater Hannover
Invited at the Moovy Tanz Film Festival 2023 (DE); Golden FEMI Film Festival 2023 (BG); Manifest Dance-Film Festival 2023 (IND), Vesuvius International Film Festival 2023 (IT), Moving Images video dance festival 2023 (GR), Thessaloniki Cinedance International 2023 (GR), Mignolo International Screendance Festival 2023 (USA), Boreal Screendance Festival 2023 (IS), Mykonos BIennale 2023 (GR), Zêzere Cinedança Festival 2023 (PT), Athens International Digital Film Festival AIDFF 2023 (GR), GRRL HAUS CINEMA 2024 (DE), Capital Filmmaker Festival Berlin (DE).
Awards: “Best Director” - Vesuvius International Film Festival 2023 (IT)
Why when we find our selfs in strange situations we choose not to follow our instincts? How much responsibility do we carry in the fulfillment of our destiny? There is a place where human will and destiny meet and collide, pulled like a tight thread it stretches over our perception and understanding of time. Human curiosity and the animalistic dance together in a slow dense rhythm where somehow naivety plays a silent but essential role.
“Il peso del fango”
Concept, choreography, dancers: Alessandra La Bella and Francesca Ciaffoni
Developed at Black C Art Gallery, Gainesville, USA 2019
Photographer: Ani Collier
Music: Bohren & Der Club Of Gore
Special thanks to Black C Art Gallery and Ani Collier
With our naked skin and bones, we take our very first breath with no shame or malice. Throughout life our inner state changes and transforms: labels, pressure, ideal beauty and experiences become few of the layers. But what will really stick? What are the things that we will never be able to get rid of? Will we ever be able to re-connect to that ancient divine state?