Orchids (2024)
„Orchids was born out of the need for me, as a cis-hetero-male choreographer,
to critically engage with my gender identity and the way it influences my work.
The piece is an attempt to de-patriarchalise the representation of men on stage,
both in the choreographic content and in the general artistic concept.”
(Léonard Engel)
Three male dancers create a space of tenderness and vulnerability in the search for utopian forms of masculinity. They traverse the dependency of birth, the necessary agonies of grief, relationships to the natural world, and the weight of societal expectations in a series of attempts at discovering non-hegemonic ways of being a man in a patriarchal society.
The piece is influenced by notions of care and empathy, homosocial relationships and the feminist potential of the abject. Choreography was developed by guided improvisations and was informed by conversations and feedback with Olympia Bukkakis. Costumes by Magdalena Emmerig play with notions of modesty, ornamentation and exposure, while light by Raquel Rosildete creates a shifting ephemeral space in which the moving male body is presented as an object of beauty.
Through the interactions of Tian Rotteveel, Rupert Enticknap, and Mikael Marklund, ‘Orchids’ aims to create space for doubts, gentleness, compassion, and the potential for more tender forms of masculinity.
(Olympia Bukkakis)
Premiere 19.01.2024, schwere reiter (Munich, GER)
Concept & Choreography Léonard Engel
By and with Tian Rotteveel, Rupert Enticknap & Mikael Marklund
Costume Design Magdalena Emmerig
Light Design & Techical direction Raquel Rosildete
Outside eye Olympia Bukkakis
Production Management Elsa Büsing
On music by Mary Lattimore
Duration 60 min
A production by Léonard Engel, funded by the Departments of Arts and Culture of the City of Munich, made possible with the support of the Bayerischer Landesverband für zeitgenössischen Tanz (BLZT) financed by funds from the Bayerisches Staatsministerium für Wissenschaft und Kunst.
With the friendly support of Tanztendenz München e.V.
Images
Videos
Critics
So there it is, the body from scratch, in a kind of laboratory from which all external influences are locked out. The very fact that Engel’s performers expose themselves to this vacuum and to our gaze redefines the concept of courage: dancer Mikael Marklund, performer, choreographer and composer Tian Rotteveel and countertenor Rupert Enticknap have very different male bodies in purely visual terms. Differently built, differently trained, but equally naked in the performance situation, defenceless and vulnerable, undescribed and, as it were, uninhabited.
The way they gradually grow into these bodies and dance with them into the open is touching. They keep a maximum distance from clichés of masculinity. No machismo, nothing martial, no more pretence than being.
Sabine Leucht, „Unkontrollierbare Aspekte des Körpers“, tanznetz.de