método negro (black method) | Dance from Spain

método negro (black method) JAVIER MARTIN

Black method is the new play by Javier Martín, Spanish choreographer, dancer, and researcher, whose career path constitutes a firm bet on the development of new corporal languages. Expressionist echoes emanate from this performance in which the dancer travels for an hour around different physical states and qualities of movement whilst getting familiar with objects and symbolic acts. These are being spread out step by step in a constructed space in front of the audience. Black method revolves around the ideas of presence and absence, of the individual and the multitude, time, and how to overcome formal structures which go through our cultural system, all to conform to our new sensitivities. The piece confines itself to the movement of arts, placed somewhere between performance, installation, contemporary action, dance, and research processes. In the words of Javier Martín: “Choreography meets with “the other” in a trial of strength between the real and its double. It is an exercise that hopes to overcome absence. ‘The other half you do not see, the void that the shining light comes from’. By dancing it, you do not unravel the presence of the form, for the movement happens through the disappearance of the form. You overcome the absence, an imperceptible becoming.” The artistic proposal identifies and works critically with some of the systems adopted by the contemporary science, and the general popular culture of body and movement, what Javier Martin calls performative metaphors (they can also be techniques). Without forgetting them, the Black Method works from its verification to signal how, in its repetition, such metaphors or techniques eventually become inertial. The proposal of the Black Method consists in distilling what accumulates inertia in our bodies. This way we seek to reflect on, and attack new practices and methods that consider, as a point of origin, its disappearance. It is the development of a mature art form that considers and contemplates its own disappearance.” Credits and datasheet

Premiered: 12/05/2018 / Available

a dance work by javier martín | performing arts
duration: 60 minutes

_creation and performance: javier martín
_lighting design: octavio mas
_artistic direction assistance: sabela mendoza
_dressing: marieta gonzález y manolo cremallera
_photography: carlos bernar, sara roca
_video recording: félix fernández
_video editing: jm
_original idea, scenography and design: jm

_artistic residencies: EIRA, Lisboa; Polo Cultural Gaivotas, Lisboa; L’animal a l’esquena, Girona; Residencias Paraíso, Colectivo rpm/Teatro Colón, A Coruña.

_collaborations (researching works): UNAM-Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México (Mexico); TotemDance House, Kiyv (Ukraine); ETSAC-Escuela Técnica Superior de Arquitectura A Coruña (Spain); Cámara anecoica Facultad Ingeniería de Telecomunicaciones, Universidad Vigo (Vigo, Spain); CDG-Centro Dramático Galego (Santiago de Compostela, Spain); Fundación Luis Seoane (A Coruña, Spain); CIFP Anxel Casal – Monte Alto (A Coruña, Spain); Teatro Rosalía de Castro (A Coruña, Spain); Facultad Ciencias de la Salud & INEF-Instituto Educación Física, UDC A Coruña (A Coruña, Spain).

_collaborations for touring: INAEM Instituto Nacional de las Artes Escénicas y de la Música (Ministry of Culture of Spain); Instituto Cervantes de Lisboa (Lisbon, Portugal); AGADIC Axencia Galega das Industrias Culturais (Galician Agency for Cultural Industries).

_work in progress’ first shows: 4 y 5/ 04/ 2018, Teatro Colón, A Coruña
_premiere: 12/ 05/ 2018, Teatro Rosalía Castro, A Coruña
_tour: 13/ 06/ 2018, Salón Teatro, Santiago de Compostela (Feria Galicia Escena Pro); 8 y 9/ 09/ 2018, Teatro Ibérico, Lisboa (Portugal); 14, 15 y 16/02/2019, Centro Cultural Conde Duque, Madrid; 10 y 11/05/2019 ‘aproximación a Método negro’, Museu da Marioneta, Lisboa; 17/05/2019, La Rambleta, Valencia (Festival 10 Sentidos); 23/04/2021, C.C. Eduardo Úrculo, Madrid (21Distritos)

JAVIER MARTIN

I am a choreographer, researcher, and performer. Currently, I am developing a research project —of an epistemological and critical nature— on the arts of movement. Stemming from choreographic and performative creation and conceptually overflowing into different discursive genres and their implementation, such as: writing, performative conferences, work processes accompanied by laboratories and work groups, research group activation and development, seminar development, or the accompaniment of training itineraries in different universities. In my projects, I work with Octavio Mas (lighting and technical direction) and Sabela Mendoza (production and mediation).

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