I am interested in a human being, who is safe, but unwilling to accept others who are fleeing war, conflict, oppression, death and hunger. I’m interested in the situation of conflict, danger and suffering. And what that fed, happy, Western European man would feel in such a place, and what he would feel towards people whose daily reality is a struggle for life.

“So many people: infants, children, young men and women, couples, families, elderly and disabled people, representing every stage of life and every type of man, that you can meet in your neighbourhood.” [fragment of text , volunteer , the refugee camp in Dobova, Slovenia]

One of the elements of the spectacle is the documentation of performance From the water, which took place on the beach in Sopot, in October last year on the Solidarity Day with Refugees. It was my comment on migrants dying at sea, bringing the images into our reality, Polish, tangible. To rise empathy in viewers, unresponsive observers.

Aurora Lubos (PL)

Aurora Lubos
Independent artist and performer associated with the contemporary dance scene in Gdańsk and Britain. Author of several powerful and original solo performances, in which she speaks out against domestic violence among other topics.
Born in 1977.
She is the author of several original dance shows, including solo performances (Zanzibar, Unfinished, Knife, Horse and Stairs, Acts, Thou Shalt Not), installations / performances (No 1, Four Corners, Act for Two – Leftovers, Without Home),and animations (the series Winter 2010).
Since 2000, she has been an actress at the prestigious British Vincent Dance Theatre

Alex Catona
Multi-disciplinary artist with a vast international performing and teaching experience in various fields of the performing arts.Avant garde musician, dancer, writer, choreographer, visual artist, filmmaker, theatre director and dramaturg.His main area of interest is avant garde experiments within the performing and visual arts and in particular the relationship between sound, body, space and context.

The work is a site-specific readaptation of my video installation “La raccolta” from 2013. It is a video installation, which combines footage shot at the height of the government crisis in 2013 which lead Silvio Berlusconi to step down from his office. The images of a rich garden inToscana region, left there to rot away, represented the most accurate metaphor of Italy after 20 years of his governance. The audio is the speech held by Berlusconi after the election victory in 1994, in which he promised to “take to the field”.
The work is a site-specific readaptation of my video installation “La raccolta” from 2013. It is a video installation, which combines footage shot at the height of the government crisis in 2013 which lead Silvio Berlusconi to step down from his office. The images of a rich garden inToscana region, left there to rot away, represented the most accurate metaphor of Italy after 20 years of his governance. The audio is the speech held by Berlusconi after the election victory in 1994, in which he promised to “take to the field”.

Anna Sobczak (PL)

Born in Poland, emigrated to Germany at the age of 7. Studied Fine Art in Syria, Brasil and
Italy. Based in Napoli, Italy.
Having changed residence country over 10 times in my life, communication has become a vital skill – a necessity that has had major influence on the ideas and the methods I work with. My main experience is in woking with communities locally and in design for social purposes. I use interactive approaches (preceded by a period of research), usually interviews or talks, and transform the resulting ideas or images in installations, performances or sculptures, themselves sometimes being interactional. Not linear at all,those steps cross-fertilize.
I have touched issues as hearing impairment, women’s rights, sexual harassment, mafia related environmental crimes, rituals and violence. I feel inspired by Situationist theory as well as P. L.Wilson, both focused on creating temporary spaces for the purpose of pursuing authentic desires, putting major weight on the appropriation and changeability of public space.I have worked as an actor and dancer for many years, which certainly influenced my way of interacting with space and people, and the creation of poetical images. Very often, lacking language skills or knowledge of cultural codes, the only way to meet on common ground is through the language of the others. Understanding and expressing myself through their experience helps me to unveil the poetry of ordinary life. In this process both parts are essential: the outer world as well as my glance. Offering an experience to the observer is very powerful, in the sense that it makes her/him understand where power allocation happens in everyday life, and boils it down for me to the conviction that call center employees and garbage men go through the same heroic challenges as described in ancient mythology.Twisting reality through my art is another way of giving relief from oppressive structures.

Crossword came out in June 2016 with the idea to create a choreography which was inspired or made use of the theme of “voice”.
I got curious on the emotional impact that a dialogue of voices can have on people, adding the restriction to use a language that the dancers didn’t understand. Working with British dancers I had the opportunity to use Italian dialogues. My aim was to create a solo for each dialogue that worked on its own, both emotionally and choreographically, and find a complementary aspect when by the end all the solos come together simultaneously in the space, creating an intricately woven visual scene. The result was a deeply emotional and human response and a textured physical language. During the performance the audience will be able to gradually piece together the work as it unfolds in front of them, solo by solo, each complimenting the other to create a rapturous, rhythmical finale. Bringing this work to Italy will bring the audience and the performers to explore a completely different experience due to the language barrier, therefore leaving the movement language as their only way to connect to one another.

Matteo Marfoglia (UK)

Matteo started to approach choreography for the first time thanks to the choreographic platform run by Introdans (NL) where he created Just A Breath and won the second prize at the Certamen Internacional de Coreografìa Burgos-New York. He returned to choreography later via Alternative Routes, National Dance Company Wales’ annual choreographic platform, where he continued to develop his approaches to choreography, playing with different techniques and involving new art forms. Pieces included: Crossing Paths, Omertà, Desensitized and Crossword.
Matteo was recently awarded by OneDanceUK as future leader in British Dance.

A constantly-mutating action in which gestures are notes on a journey towards an undefined place, where beauty in the fruit of conquest. Cosmopolitan Beauty is the kingdom of lost things that have left a trace in the body, a contradictory space in which one becomes aware of the fragility of things, but also of their strength: an island circumscribed within itself, but at the same time oper that hosts it.

Davide Valrosso / Associazione Culturale Van (IT/Firenze)

Graduated from English National Ballet, Davide studied at numerous contemporary training centers such as London Contemporary, Ramber School, Rafineri ecc. For five years he has worked steadily with Virgilio Sieni, both as a dancer and as a performer and trainer within the Accademia del Gesto. During his career he has also worked as an interpreter with visual artists and choreographers, including: Tino Sehgal, Paolo Bronstein, Ariella Vidach Laura Corradi, Paolo Mohovich, Gustavo Ramirez, Jacopo Godani, Eugenio Scigliano, Raymon Sullivan, Daniele Ninarello, Antonello Tudisco, Raphael Bianco, Pascal Touzeau, Cristina Rizzo, Fabrizio Favale.Currently engaged as a dancer in the “Cosmopolitan Beauty” project, produced by CANGO_Centro di produzione sul linguaggio del corpo e della danza and supported by the Teatro Pubblico Pugliese (selection of Anticorpi XL 2017) and in his latest “We_Pop” project, production of Festival Oriente Occidente (as associate artist) is selected at NID Platform 2017. He is also involved in the“Prove D’autore XL” project, under which he created “Whisper” for the three-year contemporary dance course of Balletto di Roma,under the artistic direction of Roberto Casarotto. Davide will soon be involved in the creation of “70.000” for the Accademia Nazionale di Danza of Rome.

Is it possible to make the limit of manipulation to be danced? Every day we are manipulated…product placement, advertisements, campaigns, public opinion, media, authority – those are CREATORS of the fasion, of our awareness – they are entering our life very skillfully and very gently. The power of those mechanism is all-encompassing. Free market, free choice is illlusory. All the time we are questioned on conditions that are imposed on us, in the world determined by constant progress chase, vissuality, illlusion, casting, creation on sale, marketing.
Is number of “likes” on Facebook is the measure of our reality nowadays?
PRYZMAT DANCE COMPANY focused on the subject of manipulation, its strength, its limits . In the middle of those behaviors there is always a human. PRYZMAT try to present the picture of complicated human relations in the world where the human body as well as feelings become products for sale. Is it possible to live with other face then yours?
“Selfie” – A photography that one has taken of oneself, typically one taken with a smartphone or webcam and shared via social media. It is the most popular word in 2013 according to Oxford University Press.

Pryzmat Dance Company (PL)

PRYZMAT DANCE COMPANY is professional dance company (from 2007) and belongs to ARToffNIA dance and art foundation from Olsztyn (Poland). Artistic Director, choreographer and President of the foundation is Katarzyna Grabińska (awarded by President of Olsztyn City, artistic foundations as well as during festivals receiving individual choreography awards and few artistic scholarships).
PRYZMAT DANCE COMPANY is created by people whose communication language is dance theatre. The Company and Foundation are producing spectacles, interdisciplinary projects, dance art meetings, carrying constant educational activity of kids, teenagers and adults. The dancers are taking part in co-productions, constantly cooperating with Warmia and Masuria Filharmony, Planetarium in Olsztyn, Theatre of S.Jaracz in Olsztyn (e.g.Opera „Jaś i Małgosia” directed by Włodzimierz Nurkowski, „Amahl i nocni Goście” directed by Janusz Kijowski in Filharmonia in Olsztyn, spectacle „Sztumistrz z Lublina” directed by Janusz Kijowski or project „Pink Floyd” and “The Best of Queen Show” in Planetarium in Olsztyn) as well as own productions (e.g. recently spectacle „The Selfies” directed by Katarzyna Grabińska or „Carpe(t) Diem” directed by Anna Piotrowska in Theatre of S.Jaracz in Olsztyn or „5 Elements Show” in Filharmonia – where 150 dancers took part). PRYZMAT DANCE COMPANY is organizing international projects such us:
– in 2014 artistic residence in Barcelona to make new production „I see a spider” directed by Spanish choreographers Mirei de Querol, Cecili Colacrai, Anna Rubirola
– in 2015 artistic residence in Israel to take part in workshops with Batsheva Dance Company, Vertigo Dance Company, Yasmeen Gooder Company (as the result of the residence – new performance „WAR-iacja” and reportage film were produced )
– in 2016 take part in international theatre festival „Rożdzestwnski parad” in Sankt Petersburg with „The Selfies” spectacle
– in 2016 artistic residence in Sicily – workshops with Anna Piotrowska and work on new production „Carpe(t) Diem” with its premiere in Theatre im.S.Jaracza in Olsztyn on December 2016 and in Rozbark Theatre in Bytom on April 2017 (as part of the program „Rozbark Residence”)
One of the activity of the Company is education. There are 10 groups of young dancers who are professionally trained on daily basis. They are taking part in different projects , getting involved in own productions as well as with the Company and taking part in festivals, competitions.

Wakefield Poole is the name of one of the American dancers that joined the Ballets Russes de Montecarlo, and who was also a porno gay filmmaker.
In Visiones y revisiones I establish a comparative study between two works the dancer-filmmaker knows quite well. On one hand, the second act of Swan Lake, that Wakefield danced on many occasions while he work for the Ballets Russes, and on the other hand his first film from 1971, a landmark of the gay pornographic film.
The title Visions and revisions synthesizes the proposal. Vision as the ability to see but also as an imaginary perception sensed as real. Revision as the act of looking at the detail and in detail at something.
The gaze is always something individual. Through this performance-conference I share (with the audience) my vision as dancer (choreographic vision) about those two works which identify me.
This work has allowed me to enter the contact (via emails) with Wakefield Poole, who currently lives retired in La Florida (USA).
During the creation and thanks to the support received by the extinct “La Porta” I had as coach Paul B Preciado, philosopher queer professor of the university “Paris 7” and internationally renowned activist.
Wakefield Poole: Visions and revisions premiered in Barcelona at the CCCB 2010 curated by La Porta.
It is my last solo work as Mauricio González.
With this work I receive the 2015 Barcelona Critic award for the best dance solo.

Celeste González (ES) / SPANISH MATCHBOX

Premio de la crítica de Cataluña al mejor solo de danza 2015

Creación: Mauricio González
interpretación: Celeste González
Edición de vídeo : Chemi Ferreiro
Colaboración de : conservatorio de la Gomera,A ras de suelo( Las Palmas), La Porta (Barcelona),galería Saro León( Las Palmas).
Gracias a : Ricardo Santana, Beatriz Preciado, Wakefield Poole, Carmelo Salazar

Supported by Acción Cultural Española (AC/E), Program PICE (Programa para la Internacionalización de la Cultura Española)

     

Icarus is for the myth the one who goes beyond the rules, flies against the sun and is punished with death. Here Icarus does not die, he is alive with a skeleton of wings. His action against the rules is not, as believed, a question of pride, but a rebellious and crazy act to take an alternative way in opposition to the established power (father, society, external judgment). Icaro is living another chance in today’s world, whereof knows no laws. the normal life is absurd in his hands, with his behavior. It is like a misfit who can not homologate. Society on one hand welcomes him as a myth, but on the other hand does not understand, nor approve him, and considers him a disabled person, a loser, a dreamer.
This work is an hymn to failure, to loss of control, to risk, to pursuing one’s desire, to accepting to be losers, as aliens in the world. Icarus’s desire is flight and light, a place of beauty and extreme danger, risk and life at the same time. The labyrinth, the ecstasy, the encounter with the sun, the challenge, the excess, the power of loss, a lysergic liturgy of dissent.

AZUL – Serena Gatti e Raffaele Natale (IT/Viareggio)

We are interested in meeting people, talking to their senses, to choose between the signs the most necessary, the most honest. Our muses are the wonder, poetry, travel, theater, music, light, dance. We build a syncretic language, which speak for signs, for forms, sounds. We do not believe in a predetermined genre, but we agree with our style to the need, the poetic act. We are moving towards a no show theater, made of vision meeting.Taking suggestions of spaces as a springboard, and backing our process with social context and literary sources, we are interested in exploring questions on relationships between spaces sounds, movement, and the public. Instead of bringing people to theatre, we believe in bringing theatre and performance to people and to non theatrical spaces. This is why we often work with site-specific productions, especially devised for abandoned, close or forgotten spaces.

This work wants to generate a repertoire of iconographies of the human body, and at the same time to work with the sound and the scenery like symbols of the scenery. Andrei Rublev takes as a starting point and a title the movie of Andrei Tarkovsky rolled in 1966, where the painter iconoclast Andrei Rublev (1360 – 1427) realizes a long trip in the medieval Russia to paint the frescos of the cathedral of the Annunciation of the Kremlin. The work of the singular painter, with its only iconographic style, provokes in the spectator an impact and interior withdrawal due to the use of the inverted perspective, which speaks to us about the art not like a portrait of the reality but like a reality between the realities.

Societat Doctor Alonso(ES)

Sofía Asencio and Tomàs Aragay are the company co-directors. Every show or project is begun from scratch, so that they can rethink their artistic language each time. Mixing genres, stage formats and types of people, they create their own way of inhabiting the stage. They like to use the stage, where we would expect to see something spectacular, as the setting for something as unspectacular as possible, so creating a poetic pathos.
Societat Doctor Alonso set up their base in a rural area, the village of Pontós in the province of Girona, to move away from the ‘noise’ and the ‘uniformity’ that surrounds contemporary creation and the arts in a big city like Barcelona. This allowed them to turn their gaze inward in search of their own voice. By creating in a local and rural environment, and finding their place within their own cultural traditions, they are in a position to construct a strong and universal discourse from their peripheral perspective.
By the same token Societat Doctor Alonso have developed a clear will for continuous exchange with the outside world, a desire supported by a double conviction: on the one hand, the need to keep a close eye on the creative directions being developed abroad; and on the other, the overwhelming imperative of showing their work to audiences from a wide range of cultural backgrounds, so that the variety of reactions can in turn provide an enriching artistic feedback.
Societat Doctor Alonso collaborate with a broad selection of interdisciplinary artists, often continuing these collaborations across an extensive range of projects.

I’ll See You Out There is an artistic project born in the summer of 2015 in London and intent to expand into different cities and non-conventional locations of exposure. Designed and directed by Agnese Reginaldo, the project saw the participation of five international artists staging a collective exhibition, which took place on board of an old minesweeper along the Thames banks. I’ll See You Out There through interactive performance and video installations, investigate the process with which technology has changed our way of interacting with others, creating new forms of language.
The works presented are a reaction to the contemporary communication system, and reflect on how this different way of interaction changes our perception of relationships, exploring everyday encounters.
At Alto Fest, I’ll See You Out There explores different ways of perceiving places that surround us, and how our presence, in them differs differently. Three artists with as many videos as each of them immerses and investigates the sense of their presence in those places soon scene of duel, disbelief and contemplation.

Agnese Reginaldo Curator (IT/UK)

Eden Mitsenmacher
Born 1987 in the USA; works in Rotterdam and Tel Aviv.
She Combines performance, video and installation to take a critical yet engaging view of social, political and cultural issues, using pop culture and creating familiarity and accessibility.
Holds a BFA from Goldsmiths College University of London and an MFA from the Dutch Art Institute. Has participated in several exhibitions world wide, including; Istan- bul Biennial, the Van Abbe Museum in the Netherlands, Holon Design Museum, Liverpool Bien- nial, Arebyte Gallery London, ANILOGUE, Animation Festival Budapest, Internationale Kurz- FilmFestival Hamburg Germany and many more.

Luigi Galasso
Born 1982 in Naples; lives and works in London.
Graduated at the Accademy of Art in Naples where he studied painting, soon he led his interest towards photography and video, attending the master at the Fine Art Academy NABA in Milan. He mainly works with video, photography and installation and his research revolves around social issues. The artist’s work has been shown in several national group exhibitions in cities such as Naples, Rome and especially in Milan where he has been represented by Famiglia Margini Gallery directed by Grace Zanotto.

Peter Matthews
Born 1978 in Derby, England, lives and works between England and Taiwan.Graduated with an MFA and BA Hons in Fine Art from the Nottingham Trent University. Working closely with the ocean, his research is motivated by the notions of discovery and exploration, mixing a range of practices that feature video, installation, drawing, painting and performance. He has been included in numerous group exhibitions internationally and around the UK including: Power of the Sea, Royal West of England Academy, Bristol, Appendage, Konnektor, Forum für Künste, Hannover, Germany, After Image: Contemporary Artists and Photography, Art House Productions Gallery, New Jersey, USA and many others.

Cosaltro Esperimenti is a matrix that generates a different musical experiment each time, according to the location, relationships, and sound possibilities.

Ex.1 > A ritual sound-inspired by “yellow face” (San Gennaro patron of Naples), whose blood is owned by the Neapolitan people. Lava music. Scenery and costume by Federica Terracina.
Historical and literary consultant, Francesco Andoli (journalist, “Identitá Insorgenti”)

Ex. 2 > A car. Three spectators. A driver. All around the city. The music inside. A concert in the Teatromobile in movement.

Antonino Talamo (IT/Napoli)

Musicista, Percussionista, Strumentista Live & Studio Recording.
Capace di un virtuosismo ludico con cui dosa sonorità e ritmi, creando estemporaneamente partiture travolgenti in cui si incrociano le fonti disparate, dall’elettronico al tribale, con una spiccata capacità di coinvolgere il pubblico in un qui ed ora inatteso, continuamente sorprendente.
In lui si incrociano i linguaggi musicali del sud del mondo dagli stili della Rumba alla musica della Capoeira afrobrasiliana, dalle percussioni afrobrasiliane agli stili tipici delle Escolas de Samba, oltre ai ritmi tipici del Nord Est del Brasile (Samba Enredo, Samba Pagode, Samba Reggae, Timbalada, Maracatù de Baque Virado), e i più conosciuti ritmi del Candomblè ecc. suonati con tutti gli strumenti della tradizione con tecniche e pronuncia tipica.
Suona con Peppe Sannino, Pietro Sinigaglia, Gloria Clemente, Kal Dos Santos,Iacopo Pellegrini, Gilson Silveira, Armanda Desidery, Rino Borriello, Galo Cadena, Roberto Lagoa, Corrado Cordoba, Nunzio Toscano, Annalisa Madonna, Fabio Gallucci, Antonio Pinto, Angelo Ricci, Michele Maione, Gianluca Campanino, Alberto Falco (MOMODUO 2010), Paolo Licastri, Giulia Capolino, Guido Schiraldi, Luca Cioffi,Francesco Manna, Duccio D’alò, DIONISO FOLK BAND, Fabrizio Alessandrini, Mario Sapia e altri.
Dal 2003 Lavora sull’organico, la strumentazione e la storia della Musica Popolare Afrobrasiliana. Prima col gruppo Ordinho e poi col gruppo Maracatudo. Gestisce ed organizza l’attività concertistica e didattica del primo nucleo Ritmico Musicale Ricreativo di Stile Afrobrasiliano a Napoli.
Dal 2010 è il percussionista del “Collettivo Salvador Irmao”, che propone Musica Popolare Brasiliana.
Collabora In Studio Recording: 2002 Chic’n’Bossa demo recording – Registrato da Fabrizio Alessandrini; 2003-2007 – Maracatudo Demo – Registrato da: Salvio Loffredo, Gennaro Jax Stigliano; 2007 Raiz “Uno” Universal Domestic – Nanninella X, Arrangiamento Organico di Percussioni e Registrazione; 2008 Dioniso Folk Band – Disco Omonimo; 2008 Peppe Sannino – Onn e Terra; 2009 Fabrizio Alessandrini – Piccoli Sogni Strani; 2010 Stefania Tarantino; 2010 Giulia Capolino.
Conduce una fervida attività didattica, portando la sua musica in contesti disagiati.
Dal 2005 è uno degli Artisti dellʼAssociazione Mus-e Italia Onlus, che si occupa dell’insegnamento del Ritmo delle Percussioni ai bambini delle scuole elementari nelle zone disagiate di Napoli.
Lavora presso La “Fondazione YHEUDI MENUHIN” (http://www.menuhin-foundation.com/) per il progetto VOICES FOR TOMORROW, come Artista-Ambasciatore per l’interscambio di culturale tra i popoli d’Europa.

Last is the ultimate work from Frantics with premiere in Sophiensaele. It was awarded by the press and the public in Berlin.
In this piece, we examine the contradictory phenomena of time. We play with blurry pictures of the past or the future, trying to get a closer approach of how memory in humans behave when they remember, recreate or imagine situations. It seems that we are watching our lives going back and forth, and in various game arrangements we let this pictures repeat, collapse and freeze, stretch and accelerate, crash and rebuild, always jumping back and forth in time.
“Last” is like a blurred film, like memories in an amnesic person, when reality and dreams start being twisted and mixed.

Frantics Dance Co. (DE)

The name “Frantics” comes from the translation of the Spanish word “Frenesí” meaning of mental agitation, wild excitement, derangement, extreme passion.
Frantics was founded in 2013 in Berlin by Juan Tirado , Carlos Aller , Marco di Nardo and Diego de la Rosa . In 2015 and 2016 Eva Georgitsopoulou and Young-Won Song became part of the company.
Frantics main influences are Breakdance, Experimental Hip Hop, Contemporary dance, Martial arts, Gaga.
Frantics is in a continuous experimentation and
research of movement, merging urban dance,
improvisation techniques with a high level of energy and dance theater. Their goal is to create a strong link between the audience and their physicalities.
In 16/17 Frantics became the most promising upcoming company in Berlin. They were selected by a jury to present their newest production “Last” in one of the most important theaters in Berlin, Sophiensaele. After the performance, they won the audience’s prize and the press carried the news of their new wave of contemporary dance.
Redbull followed Frantics during their new creation “Last” making an overwhelming article of Frantics movement philosophy and about the concept of our new piece.

Supported by

LuchaLibro is nowadays a very popular literary improvisation contest in Peru, where it all begun, and it’s supported by the Ministerio de Cultura. In Spain is becoming mora and more popular where is hold in literary events in different cities across the country. The contest challenges their matched participants, in a championship setup with 3 words (same for each contestant) and 5 minutes to generate, in front of an audience, a solid and exciting literary content. Participants will jump on stage with Mexican wrestling masks ready for the fight and the audience will decide who is the winner of each fight until we get to the final.
Under the founders of LuchaLibro consent, this year Spanish Matchbox proudly presents on its roaming set up the opportunity to hold a contest at Altofest in Naples.
This literary improvisation contest will encourage participants to test their own writing and improvisation skills. At the same time it makes the act of writing come out of the shadow, quiet and loneliness that it is associated with, to become a powerful performing act empowering performer and writers in public scenarios.
Do you want to get in the ring?

El Guatequista brings a smooth selection of danceable hits of anything from jazz, swing, soul, rock and roll to wherever the night might lead us. El Guatequista´s main purpose is to make your feet dance without you noticing at first, until you hit the dance floor out of your head. For this special occasion he has selected some of the best kept secrets of each genre, and he is bringing them in Spanish…

Hugo Clemente (ES) / SPANISH MATCHBOX

Hugo Clemente‘s background is vast and wide ranging. He has a degree in Social Psychology; he has been teaching advanced Spanish at University level in US and held creative writing workshops in Spain, US and Norway; he has worked as a therapist in a methadone program; he has been a surf- and snowboard monitor; he is a musician and DJ amongst others things.
His writing has an immense scope where he has written for magazines and various literary and counterculture fanzines, he has compiled lyrics for several albums for the punk and hardcore band Hiperkorë and he regularly writes on his blog No toques nada. His novel Cuaderno de Agua was published by Canalla Ediciones in 2013 and he was a finalist of LuchaLibro Canarias in Spain. He has participated in PervertiDos, Ménades: an invitation to euphoria and has scripted for theater and cinema. One of his latest accomplishments include the documentary The Blinking Island (2016), of which has been selected for several festivals. He has collaborated with the International Journal of Iberian Studies, Mondo Sonoro, Los Barbaros (NY), Calviva and Pildora Sonora among others.

Spanish Matchbox was born from a platform project by Creación Contemporánea Española, in the E&G Teater Festival (Stamsund, Norway), after several international activities. Now we are going a step beyond, changing our shape from festival to a cellar production system, able to be set in different contexts and festivals, sharing our same aims, increasing the possible relationships with the involved projects. We inaugurate this new shape with Altofest, the perfect context for the first feedback.

     

The lieder is a Javier Cuevas and Sara Serrano project in collaboration with: Adán Hernández (writer and performer, Tenerife www.solucionesdramaticas.com), Pilar Beltrán (Pianist, Murcia www.pilarbeltran.es), Raffaella Menchetti (Performer and video artist, http://raffaellamenchetti.tumblr.com/) and Miguel Morales (Film Director, Tenerife https://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Miguel_G._Morales). Light design: Octavio Gómez Vázquez.

THE LIEDER: TWO ACTS OF RESISTANCE

A coreographic, instalative and musical project by Javier Cuevas and Sara Serrano. A project created through open and collaborative practices with artists related to music and choral singing, called in residence and exhibition contexts, based on the repercussions of marching, hymns and collective singing on the body (as a physical body and as a political and ideological corpus); and its build up from resistance, non-producting, the weird, the participation and the questioning on the roles of artist-audience. A transit from the archaic-collective to the domesticated-artificial. From the primitive singing and walking till the choral collective singing and the bourgeois lied.

A DISPOSITIVE
AN INSTALLATION
A DANCE PIECE
MARCHING FOR AN UNKNOWN COMMON MOTIF
AND A PRIVATE AND SECRET INTENTION
A YOGA ASANA
WALK AWAKE AND IN SILENCE
DOUBT TO FIND THE COMMON
AN HYMN WITH JUST ONE WORLD
THE WISH OF BELIEVING IN SOMETHING
TO KEEP THE BOUND
TO ATTEND THE SIGNS WITH DISPOSITION
TO JOIN THE MARCH
TO DO ON THE RUN/MARCH
TO WALK ON THE STEPS OF OTHERS
APPROACH THE ARCHAIC – UNKNOWN
TO MARCH FOR THINGS COMING TO YOU
TO REACH THE FORM AFTER THE ACTION
AN IDEA THAT, WHILE MARCH GOES, STAYS BEHIND

Javier Cuevas / Sara Serrano (ES/NO) / SPANISH MATCHBOX

Javier Cuevas (Murcia, 1973) Dramaturgist, performer, curator and context-generator for contemporary performing arts. Artistic director of the Live Arts Lab – Theatre Leal of La Laguna (Tenerife, Canary Islands). www.leal-lav.com.
Presents Gracias (1”) LIMITES (2011, Auditorio de Tenerife, Hamlet Post Scriptum (Teatro Victoria, Tenerife)and Love is a dog that comes from Hell (2013, Teatro Guimerá, Tenerife). He is currently working with Sonia Gómez (BAILARINAS); with Amalia Fernández (EL RESISTENTE Y DELICADO HILO MUSICAL), with E&G Teater Norway & Sara Serrano (ULTRAPERIFEROA 40º) and with Carlota Mantecón (LO REAL). THE LIEDER is his last project (premier in 2017). He has presented his work in Spain, Brazil, Germany, Italy, Argelia and Norway.

Sara Serrano (Murcia, 1974) is a mediaturgist. Degree in Stage Directing and Art History. Master in Art. Theatre Practice, by Rose Bruford College (university of Manchester). As an extension of her work in the field of Performing Arts, she has worked with installations and multimedia montage and she has a long experience in Art Production, Exhibition Design and Cultural events Management. She presents her Works as contexts as
Fringe-NY (SOLEDAD.ES), International Brisbane Arts Festival-Australia (DO-DO LAND) or Black Box in Oslo-Noruega (THE ANSWERING MACHINE). Founder, by Eduardo Balanza of DFH, with whom she produced different pieces that mix installation, performance and video, as ATTA AIRLINES. KIT DE SEGURIDAD (CaixaForum, ARCO). Currently living in Oslo (Norway) where she collaborates with Ossavy & Kolbenstvedt, Jo Strømgren
Kompani & Ruk Ruk Company (co-founder). She also works in Spain with projects as THE LIEDER (premier in 2017).

Spanish Matchbox was born as a platform of Spanish contemporary creation that, after several international activities, crystalized at a Festival in E&G Teater (Stamsund, Norway). Now they are taking one step beyond, changing their shape from festival to a cellar production system, able to be set in different contexts and festivals, sharing our same aims, increasing the possible relationships with the involved projects. They inaugurate this new shape with Altofest, the perfect context for the first feedback.

     

This performance brings to the stage the question of the identity of the female dancer-performer. It uses elements of contemporary dance, dance theatre, cabaret performance, live music and magic show.
To examine that, the authors create imaginary identities, Ms Fox and Ms Cat, who are joined by the mysterious Mr Eye on the piano.
They begin by questioning classic approaches to choreography, by dealing in an ironic way with Ravel’s Bolero, one of the ballet block-busters.
Diving deeper into the imagination and theatre as the space of magic, they perform with 100 miniature performer-statues, creating a vortex of shadowy performances.
In monologues, they deal with two different approaches to textuality on stage, using parts of Virginia Woolf’s last novel Between the Acts and Erica Fisher Lichte’s The Transformative Power of Performance. Identifying the performer as magician – entertainer, the authors use Macbeth Witches, but their magic dance is a classic Charleston. The end brings the performers back to their first identity – contemporary dance, and the dance improvisation, while the stage becomes a visually magical and wild place, drowned in dramatic and rich
sound.

Kik Melone (HR)

Silvia Marchig (Rijeka, 1975), dance artist and dance educator, based in Zagreb. Co-founder and artistic director of Kik Melone Company. Works in the field of contemporary dance theatre and performance.
Her primary artistic interests for many years are experimental performative situations, using dance, voice and text in her work.
Author of several theatre pieces, always in collaborations with fellow artists through Kik Melone Company, as well as working as a performer in many independent projects in Germany (Desperate Figures Dance Theater, Mainz), and in Croatia (Fourhanded/Četveroruka, Trafik, IMRC, Llinkt Dance project, Marmot…).

Iva Nerina Sibila (1971, Zagreb) is a dance artist and writer. She graduated from the Northern School of Contemporary Dance in Leeds (1995) and since then she has been working as free-lance dancer, performer, choreographer, educator and dance-writer nationally and internationally.
Current artistic activities are:
Artistic leadership of Inclusive Movement Research Collective – IMRC, a performance and educational dance project for dancers with and without disability,
Kik Melone – co-author and performer and Transitive Fiction Theatre – Trafik – co-author and performer.
Her texts on various issues on dance, physical theatre, performing arts and new circus have been published in numerous Croatian and international publications.
Educational works includes Centre for Women’s Studies – seminar Dance, gender and feminism and Academy of Dramatic Arts, Department for Contemporary Dance – collegium on Inclusive and integrated dance practises.

Josip Maršić
Musician, composer and sound shape artist working in fields of theatre, movies.

According to Greek legend, Parthenope cast herself into the sea and drowned when her songs failed to entice Odysseus. Her body washed ashore at Naples, on the island of Megaride, where the Castel dell’Ovo is now located. When people from the city of Cumae settled there, they named their city Parthenope in her honor.
This concert /musical improvisation drives from the myth of Parthenope and Pergolesi’s masterpiece Stabat Mater. Music composer Tilemachos Moussas and the director Elli Papakonstantinou form a dynamic unconventional duo. The music composition fuses Pergolesi’s original music scores with industrial and jazz elements, scatting and text improvisation.
During the performance a wide range of texts about Parthenope such as Homer’s Odyssey are intertwined with baroque music and the lament of the Virgin Mary; the figure of virgin Serine, here, is in dialogue with the Virgin Mary. This music journey from antiquity to Christianity with planted texts explores sound, femininity and stereotypes.

ODC Ensemble (GR)

Elli is a radical artist based in Greece. She conceives, directs and co-writes multidisciplinary performances with an emphasis on musicality, new media and philosophical discourse. In the forefront of European avant-garde, her art questions traditional expectations of audience participation with a focus on active citizenship.

Elli has studied and lived in the UK for over a decade and has worked in many countries. She and has created and presented her work in places like theEdinburgh Festival, (“Edinburgh 1st award 1997”) (UK), Athens and Epidavros Festival (GR), Princeton University, (U.S.A.), Opera House Cairo (EG), LaMaMa theatre, NY, (USA), THEATERHAUS GESSNERALLEE Zurich (CH), National Theatre of Greece (GR), SGT- Onassis Foundation (GR), Inauguration Ceremony of the Bibliotheca Alexandrina (EG), Benaki Museum (GR), Bora Bora (DE), International Festival Iraq, etc.
Her last création with ODC Ensemble “Revolt Athens” toured at the Neukollner Oper Berlin (GE), Musikteatretage Festival (AU), Antic Teatre International Barcelona (SP), Hellenic Festival of Athens (GR), etc. The show is on tour. Upcoming stop is the Operadagen Festival, Rotterdam and the BE Festival (UK)
Elli is currently working on her new site-specific creation “Luisette, the backstage of a revolution” commissioned by the Hellenic Festival of Athens and Cultural Capital Eleusis21 (due to premier in June 22).

Tilemachos Moussas
Tilemachos Moussas was born in Thessalonica, Greece.
After his studies at Agostini Music School he was offered a place and a scholarship to Berklee Music School.
He has worked with many important musicians such as:
Damo Suzuki, Savina Yannatou, Blaine Reininger, Julia Kent, Pamelia Kurstin, Lena Norin, Michel Hatzigeorgiou, Missirli Ahmet, Georgia Sylleou, Thanos Anestopoulos,
and has performed with artists such as Chico Freeman, Sheila Jordan, Jerome Rothenberg .
Tilemachos and his band have played as guest in concerts for bands and musicians such as:
Anouar Brahem, Nouvelle Vague, Brendan Perry (Dead Can Dance), Ozric Tentacles, etc
Tilemachos composed the music for several plays and performances such as:
“RE-VOLT Athens” directed by Elli Papakonstantinou -“Pulsar” directed by John Britton, “Adio Adio Amore” (part of the music) choreographed by Daphnis Kokkinos Tanztheater Wuppertal Pina Bausch and many other theatre & dance performances. He has also composed the music for several films
Tilemachos has played and performed in many well known concert halls and in Festivals all over the world such as:

• BE festival, Birmingham , UK
• Operadagen Festival, Rotterdam
• Musiktheatertage , Wien, Austria
• Neukollner Oper , Berlin, Germany
• ODEON, Paris, France
• International Festival for Experimental Theatre, Cairo, Egypt
• International Festival of Ancient Drama, Delphi, Greece
• Kunstenfestivaldesarts Brussels Belgium
• Hellenic Festival Athens Greece
• Wiener Festwochen Vienna Austria
• Oriente Occidente Festival Trento Italy
• IX Festival International de Danca Contemporanea Faro Portugal
• Mostra Sesc de Artes Mediterraneo Festival Sao Paolo Brazil
• Biennale Lyon France
• Arts Festival Singapore
• European Monodrama Festival Bitola FYROM
• SANI Jazz on the hill festival Greece

His cd’s “Kyknostalagma/Swan Drip” and “Newborn” has been released by Ankh records. He also works as an educator in Special Education.

The grace that sanctifies, the grace that frees, the grace that kills.
The master plan, the self-exaltation, the escape of man from the body, which needs the blood of the last, the outcast, the mice.
Two orphan brothers facing childhood fears, the desire to grow up and the solitude of the flight will undertake the ultimate search of their origins devising past and present worlds, experiencing imaginary pestilences and dealing with State duties.
What remains to these isolated creatures to keep going in a suspended territory, animated by sharp and dangerous presences, facing unpredictable situations and impossible and painful identities, is nothing but the desire for an identity that pacifies the eternal tension between High and Low, between the supreme and the worthless, until its tragic ending.
The oblivion of fatal choices. This is the place where Malagrazia takes place, the new work by Phoebe Zeitgeist that puts on stage the emotional dizziness of a humanity torn apart by the fear of being left behind.
The process leading to the definitive version of Malagrazia will take about a year and will be divided into stages – Islands – different places that will contribute to its evolution. Each place will be a Search Island or a Landing Step to go on stage.

Phoebe Zeitgeist (IT/ Milano)

Phoebe Zeitgeist is a group based Milano, founded in 2008. The group has to his credit eleven shows, including Loretta Strong from Copi, manifesto of the company, followed by two others show by the french/argentin dramatist. Others shows are from The Americans Blues By Tennessee Williams and from The Atrocity Exhibition by J. G. Ballard. n 2011 Phoebe Zeitgeist undertakes the performance and video project Phoebe Zeitgeist appears in Milan, inspired by the work of Rainer W. Fassbinder Blut am Hals der Katze. In 2014 Phoebe Zeitgeist realized Adulto, inspired by the final texts of Pier Paolo Pasolini, Elsa Morante and Dario Bellezza. The last show is Baal by Brecht; this work was chosen in june 2015 from IBS International Brecht Society to partecipate at the XV Symposium on Brecht, in Oxford.

Act IV, scene I, King Richard II, by William Shakespeare. Richard Il, King of England, is going to be deposed. However, Richard is mainly a poet: he abdicates and let himself be deposed as a poet. He leaves the world and dies making use of his own words. He expands the action and breaks time as only a poet can do. Just one actor in fictional conference at the moment of the deposition, in the King’s holy body. The audience, like the Lords and Peers of England, waiting for the show of the King’s fall. “A great performance, without comfortable “aesthetic” complacency, and a shareable map of a politic cultural zeitgeist, remembering the manner of Carmelo Bene. A theatrical experience which worth to be measured in these days” Gianfranco Capitta, June 17, 2007 Il Manifesto

Roberto Corradino (IT/Bari)

Roberto Corradino | Reggimento Carri was born in October 2000 out of an idea by Roberto Corradino, actor and director_It works on contemporary dramaturgy in a long-term projects. We search the truth of actor, as singular or collective through the contemporary dramaturgy, trying to regain a theater show as a collective ritual, combining tradition and new languages in a simple and popular theater, produced e coproduced with festival and theatre as Es.terni, Gender Bender International Festival, Primavera dei Teatri, Fit Lugano Festival, teatro Kismet OperA, Festival Castel dei Mondi, Teatri di vetro Festival & Romaeuropa, Teatro Pubblico Pugliese. From october 2000 reggimento carri | teatro staged Piaccainocchio, Perché ora affondo nel mio petto/Cause now I sink in to my chest by Von Kleist’s Pentesilea; Conferenza/Nudo e in semplice anarchia/Conference / Naked and in simple anarchy) taken from Shakespeare’s Richard II, Cuore/Heart. Like a drum in the night…by Edmondo De Amicis’ novel to the present day for the 150° anniversary of Italy’s Unification “Making of “Le pays lontain” a staging project by Jean Luc Lagarce, Le braci/ The Embers, L’Osso Duro/A Tough Cookie by Franz Kafka, KNØwnønê (roberto corradino is dead) morto, SKÀUSCHÊ _Now he’s working on “Cordelia”, a monologue/interview on King Lear’s disinherited daughter, and on the question what means to built the truth.

The Ikebana is the ancient Japanese art of disposing cut flowers. Its aim is to create an harmony between the flowers, the vase and the surrounding environment. Simonarossi, with no secular traditions nor real philosophy behind, aims to such a mastery: to calibrate the incidental, using a private fat as a vase and the spectators as the surrounding environment. Through a technique that “expertly connects the Atlas with the employment agency”, Simonarossi shows “how theatre, dance, dance-theatre, or whichever up to date way you want to name it, can be a realist genre.”
For this edition of Altofest Simonarossi reflects (on) Simonarossi.
A paper sheet assumes lots of shapes according to the way it’s folded. A pebble, posed within the multiple reflections of a kaleidoscope, produces fluid geometries,
What does Simonarossi become within a new flat?

Simona Rossi (IT/Roma)

Simonarossi grew and lives between dance and video but she likes to walk into others’ fields, alone or in company. She works as a dancer in France with Loïc Touzé and Ambra Senatore, and in Italy with Kinkaleri ad Barokthegreat. In France she also gives workshops for spectators to very young spectators.She studied cinema at the Roma 3 University and graduated in contemporary dance at the Laban Centre in London. Today more than yesterday, and tomorrow more than today, the body and the moving image are the starting point for her explorations in other universes.
Born and living in Rome, Stefania Carvisiglia graduated in sociology with a thesis on Performance Art. She’s been studying for years contemporary dance and she gives movement practice workshops. She’s interested in the creation and experimenting of short circuits opening the possible within the observation of reality.

In her work Made With Love the author tackles the concept of family from the perspective of the contemporary precarious working conditions. In this case, of artistic activity, which eliminate the difference between work and privacy, whereby the equalization is not related to political declarativity but rather a necessity to survive.
Under precarious working conditions, the production and reproduction blend and the production “is dispersed” through the entire sphere of life. This opens the questions of social and economic evaluation of “products” in the family sphere when this is included in work. Hence what is the social and private role of a parent, an artist and a precarious worker?
Both parenthood and artistic engagement often share the same status in society- they are supposed to be an activity/necessity/ responsibility made out of love. The author confronts the ideology behind care-work and art-work, and points at the problems of unpaid, invisible labor. Disrupting the idea of both being means of happiness and fulfilment, Made with love confronts us with uneasiness and proposes to open a discussion about a culture of commons.

Teja Reba (SI)

Teja Reba is an engaged independent artist and performance maker based in Ljubljana. She currently works as program director of City of Women- Association for Promotion of Women in Culture and as curator of its annual International Festival of Contemporary Arts. She was active in the field of cultural politics as the president of The Association for Contemporary Dance of Slovenia (2013-2016) and was board member of the Prešeren Foundation (2014-2016), responsible for highest National Awards for Arts in Slovenia. Beside her own practices, the last 10 years were devoted in developing tandem work with the artist Leja Jurišić, with whom they’ve created a variety of performances, interventions and installations, won prices and critical acclaim, toured extensively on international and national stages, participated in several European projects (Space for Live art, Imagine 2020, Identity.Move!, Spider, etc.). As performer she has developed long term relationships with choreographer Yasmine Hugonnet (2006-2009), theatre director Janez Janša (2005-2017) and was marked by the experience of working with Forced Entertainment (2013) amongst many others great artists.

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