photo by Lois Greenfield

Turning With The Worldwide Scene
Rio De Janeiro receives four spectacles representative
of the panorama of the international theater

by DANIEL SCHENKER WAJNBERG

Rio De Janeiro, a normally distant city of the international scene contemporary, will receive, from tomorrow, in Theaters II and III of the Cultural Center Bank of Brazil (CCBB) the visits of representative artists of the world-wide panorama.

The dancer Maureen Fleming, born in Japan and now living in the United States, presents "After Eros", a spectacle that resulted in the contact with butô and the classic ballet; the Odin Teatret, company of Eugenio Beard, comes represented for "Salt", scenic transposition of the text "Letters to the wind", integrant of the book "is being late excessively", of Antonio Tabucchi; the Akhe Group, of Russia, brings "White cabin", flirting with directly with the installation and the bold space, supported for technological resources; e former-integrant of the La Troppa, of Chile, arrives with "Gemelos", exempts adaptation of the romance "the great notebook", of Agota Kristof, in which the actors takes the place of dolls wooden.

Excepting "Gemelos", the spectacles were integrated into the programming of the International Festival of Theater of Londrina (Filo) that finishes next Sunday. In collaboration with Filo, The TRIBUNE BIS, is co-presenting "Salt" and "After Eros".

Rebirth is transformed into art in, "After Eros", defying the past with the vibrant present, a completely different time with new perspectives. The dancer Maureen Fleming executes slow movements, interspersed in a subjective and abstract spectacle that seems to rest on contrasts - the work incorporates the varied body of the artist and the huge space (the work was presented in the enormous Theater Green Gold, in Londrina), redefining the direction of release and the silent shout of desperation, between the slowness and the use of the apt resources of multimedia installation.

"I am interested in the opening of the internal body", states Maureen, directly influenced by butô, the dance of renaissance that appeared after-Hiroshima and Nakasaki, co-founded by Kazuo Ohno the great master -who was presented, in 1992, in the International Festival of Londrina (Filo), the figure greatly admired by the director Antunes Son, who created, in his homage, the work "Was Carmen Miranda", shown in the last edition of the Festival of Curitiba.

Maureen worked with the son of Kazuo, Yoshito, and this contact was not the only factor that provoked her approach to butô. After all, she also passed through a rebirth of her own. At only two years old, she suffered a serious car accident that could have her left paralyzed. But a x-ray showed that, throughout her life, a bone grew filling the space between fourth and the fifth vertebra column.

"I decided to create the work from my own experience", summarizes Maureen, in addition to influences of nô, kabuki, classical ballet and the myth of Eros and Psyche, "butô inherits the slow movements of nô, at the same time, it undertakes a revolution against it", she said.

As it is seen, "After Eros" does refer "only" to the first years of life of Maureen Fleming. It is a spectacle hardwired with an ancient direction, "patriarchal values are being destroyed", observe, through the work, the transcendence and the reconciliation of the human being with nature. According to Maureen, this choreography is also the result of her experience throughout the world.

"If I had lived solely in Japan or solely in the United States it would not have been possible to create my dance. My dance is something that is born of the contact with, at least, two different cultures ", she designates. "After Eros", will run also tomorrow and Friday in Theater II. After, Maureen will travel to Ireland, where she will research her next spectacle, "Immortality", based in part on "At The Hawk's Well", by W.B. Yeats, later the work that will be developed in Korea. (DSW)