Avatâra Ayuso - November 2014 — www.senanu.com

Transcripción

INTERVIEWS
http://www.senanu.com/avatara-ayuso
ABOUT
C O N TA C T
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AVA TÂ R A A Y U S O, C H O R EO G R A P H E R , AVA DA N C E
CO M PA N Y
Today we are in London, speaking with Avatâra Ayuso, 33,
creator of the AVA Dance Company which is putting on the
Provisional Landscapes premiere on 24 and 25 November
2014 at the Lilian Baylis Studio, Sadler’s Wells, London.
Tickets are available here and please visit the AVA Dance
Company website for more information.
PHOTO BY ARNAU STEPHENSON
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W h e r e a r e yo u f r o m a n d w h at i s yo u r p r ofe s s i o n a l
background?
I was born in Madrid but grew up in Mallorca. I trained in
ballet at the Conservatorio Profesional de Danza de Mallorca
and completed a BA and MA in Linguistics in the Universidad
Complutense de Madrid. In 2004 I moved to London where I
obtained a Certificate in Higher Education at the London
Contemporary Dance School. After one year here in London I
got into the D.A.N.C.E. programme
which took me to
France, Belgium and Germany over the course of two years. I
came back to London in 2007 and have been based here,
working regularly with Shobana Jeyasingh Dance (UK).
As an individual and culturally I am Spanish but as an artist I
would describe myself as English; the way I understand art
and dance is very English. You need resources like
mentorship, government support and funding to become a
dance artist and these are all things that are available here in
England.
W h y d i d y o u c h o o s e t o s t u d y L i n g u i s t i c s?
I love language, literature and history so I thought if I study
Linguistics I can study history and language together. During
my university degree I was not auditioning for jobs as a
professional dancer but I did continue my dance training.
Every day I had six hours of university classes in the morning
and then four hours of dance classes in the afternoon. It was
extremely demanding but I loved it; going to dance helped
me forget about my problems at university and going to
university helped me forget my problems in dance.
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PHOTO BY ANA GARCÍA SEGURA
Do
your
Linguistics
studies
influence
your
choreography?
Through my studies I learned how to research and as a result
the way I approach choreography now, before even going
into the dance studio, is all about researching, reading and
watching documentaries. My degree also showed me how to
pay attention to detail; I learned to analyse every single thing
and
pull
apart
information
so
now
when
I
am
choreographing details are very important in my work.
Do you consider yourself a dancer or a choreographer or
b o t h?
It took me a few years to begin to define myself and in fact it
was the English language that gave me the words to
describe myself: I am a dance artist. A dance artist is
someone who does different activities related to dance; you
could be a dancer, teacher, choreographer, researcher or
journalist. In my case I am a dancer, choreographer and
teacher.
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Ho w d i d y o u m a k e t h e l e a p f r o m b e i n g a d a n c e r t o a
c h o r e o g r a p h e r o r w a s i t a g r a d u a l p r o c e s s?
I began my ballet degree when I was seven years old and
completed it at 18, my world was ballet and neoclassical
dance. Then when I was 19, I had a major injury, I had had
many stress fractures in my tibia and it was about to break,
as a result my body began to create more bone to try and
repair itself causing a tumour in my tibia. That stopped me
dancing for a whole year which was a great shock for me at
the time because I wasn't sure what to do with my life.
I asked myself what other style of dance do I like and, after
spending a couple of years dancing tango which I loved, I
decided to go into contemporary dance. I am a big-boned
woman and I no longer wanted to make the physical
sacrifices that ballet required, it was going against my
natural body type. I had a classical dance mentality because
of my ballet training but the tumour forced me to do
something else. Now I love contemporary dance but it was
hard at the beginning because my body couldn't do some of
the things that contemporary dance required.
PHOTO BY PAU ROSS
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Te l l u s a b o u t Pr o v i s i o n a l L a n d s c a p e s .
In December 2013 I decided that I wanted to showcase my
work for the dance community in London. There are four
pieces: first, a short-dance film "Tokyo Tokyo" which leads
the audience through the magic of unfolding mystery.
Second, a highly physical duet "OneSquareMeter" which is
about crowded cities and how certain characters need to
change themselves in order to fit into a certain environment.
Third, the solo "Balikbayan" which is an atmospheric work
inspired by a Philippine woman and her story of migration.
Fourth, the quintet "Provisional Landscapes" which centres
on characters who are strangers and they find themselves in
a looped landscape which changes but always comes back
to the same point.
The four pieces can be performed
independently but they share a common theme which is the
idea of migrating, changing and finding yourself in a new
context.
Ho w m u c h d o t h e d a n c e r s i n fo r m y o u r c h o r e o g r a p hy ?
I give the dancers a task, they and I will each interpret that
task differently and perform it, I will then select the
movements that fit with the idea in my head. Sometimes I
tell the dancers when I have a half formed idea in mind and
we explore movements and ideas together and see where it
takes us. It's a bit like playing a game, I'm an only child and
when I was younger I was always developing new games in
my head. Sometimes there was an element of frustration
because I would know the game I wanted to play but
couldn't
quite
find
the
rules;
it's
the
same
with
choreography, sometimes I have an idea of where the piece
needs to go but I can't always find the way there.
Do you want the audience to go away with a certain
i n t e r p r e t a t i o n o f t h e p i e c e s?
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I don't want them only to see my interpretation, in fact, I
hope that they will put their own spin on it. I have to make
sure that my team and I have our own story that we are
developing but if the audience reads it in a different way
then that's great. Sometimes when people come to see
contemporary dance they feel that they need to understand
the story and I always say no, the story is within yourself. We
have created our story but feel free to find and interpret
your own story. I wish people would be more open and free;
of course it depends on each individual but often I find that
people have a fear of letting themselves go to be free to
understand whatever they wish from what they are seeing.
PHOTO BY ARNAU STEPHENSON
W h y w a s i t i m p o r t a n t t o y o u t o h a v e a s h o w i n L o n d o n?
It was important for me to put on Provisional Landscapes
because the dance sector in the UK knows me just as a
dancer and not as a choreographer but I strongly believe in
what I do and I want the sector to see this other side of me.
I'm happy that the show is going ahead, it has been a lot of
work and I sincerely hope that this is going to change
something in my career.
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Why are so many of the well known choreographers
m a l e?
There are many reasons, not all of which I agree with, some
people say women are not as pushy or committed as men,
which I think is silly, you just live your life and if you want
something you go for it, it doesn't matter if you are a man or
a woman. Some people say that it is because women get
pregnant, which again, I think is nonsense. You don't need to
dance to choreograph; you just need to use your brain, it
should not make a difference if you are pregnant. My feeling
is that those that direct the institutions don't do proper
research to find female choreographers and many directors
just support men. What keeps me pushing on in this
immensely competitive industry is that I still believe in
myself.
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PHOTO BY MIWAKO MIYAZAKI
A r e a l l t h e d a n c e r s i n P r o v i s i o n a l L a n d s c a p e s f e m a l e?
Yes, in general dance relies on men to do the lifting and floor
work and I wanted to show that the body of the female
dancer is not dependent on that of the male dancer; it is
quite interesting to see what the female body can do on its
own. That being said I also love working with male dancers
but at the moment in my company I'm taking female dancers
because of the concept of the pieces.
W h a t 's t h e w o r k i n g r e l a t i o n s h i p l i k e w i t h y o u a n d t h e
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d a n c e r s?
I learned to be open and ask the dancers for their opinions
when working with William Forsythe during the D.A.N.C.E.
programme. The problem with that is it encourages conflict
and that can be difficult to manage. I always say to the
dancers if there is a problem, don't wait weeks to tell me, tell
me as soon as possible. With my style of choreography the
personality of the dancers can shine through via their own
input, however, as the choreographer, the responsibility and
final decisions are mine. A lot of the time I will say no to a
dancer's suggestion because it doesn't match what I have in
mind and some dancers take it personally; I have to reassure
them that if I say no they mustn't take it personally.
W h a t h a s b e e n y o u r g r e a t e s t s u c c e s s?
Doing what I want to do, I am incredibly lucky to be
dedicating my life to dance and make a living from it. Every
single day I am thankful; I have people that love me, I do
what I love, I'm healthy and I get to travel. I love travelling
and meeting people, I get to see other cultures, ways of
living and understandings of life. I have been all over the
world and even if I can't speak the same language as
someone else, we always find a way to communicate. In this
respect I think of dance as a kind of seventh sense, it helps
me read people and their bodies in a different way.
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PHOTO BY SAMIRA HAMDIEH
CO P Y R I G H T © 2 0 1 4 - 2 0 1 5 Y V E T T E D Z A K PA S U
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Avatâra Ayuso - November 2014 — www.senanu.com

Transcripción

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