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PACAP 4
2020

João dos Santos Martins

PACAP 4
2020

Curated by João dos Santos Martins

From January to July 2020

Thinking a study plan is always a conflict between the ideal and the possible, between a certain imposition of a way of seeing and being in the world, and the creation of conditions to originate other worlds. In the words of Rabindranath Tagore, education is of no use but to respond and to rid ourselves of the “suicidal aggressiveness of collective selfishness”. This program is no more than that. Focused on experimentation, it will seek to challenge the paradigms of contemporary dance and choreography through the activation of a critical and discursive positioning, although always committed to these practices. But this program is mainly thought of as a protected time and place to encourage all participants to develop and analyze their artistic practice in a collective environment, intellectual and artistically stimulating.

 

In this program classes are not distinguished between ‘technical’, ‘research’ or other. We assume that there can be no distinction between practical and theoretical knowledge and that it is this division that induces an alienation in the work itself. The program is based solely on the proposals of the artists and speakers who will spend time with the participants, enhancing common experiences of questioning and transformation. The invited speakers share the need to demystify the body/head, action/thought, practice/theory dichotomies, seeking to articulate discourse and practice as integral parts and members of ways of making and thinking, and not as opposite poles.

 

We believe in the practice of dance as a support for artistic practice that is in permanent dialogue with other supports and with the genealogies of the history of art in general. We will seek a dialogue with these various ‘supports’ and with the agents who practice them, through visits to local artists’ studios and partnerships with surrounding structures and institutions who establish bridges with the local artistic context. And as art making is always in dialogue with its ways of apprehension, the program is continually reinforced with visits to exhibitions, film screening, going to shows and conferences of agents from various domains.

 

We believe that part of the artistic labor is necessarily self-taught. In this sense, we will privilege the cultivation of a space for sharing, collaboration and group work in order to build common knowledge and experiences that encourage participants to deepen their practices, individually or collectively. During the duration of the program, studios will be available so that participants can develop their work whose processes will be shared over six months. At the end of the cycle all participants should publicly present their work, articulating thus, as Rancière says, “the ways of doing, their corresponding forms of visibility and the possible ways of thinking their relations”. João dos Santos Martins 

Bio

João dos Santos Martins (Santarém, 1989) is an artist working through dance and choreography. He began his dance studies at the Higher School of Dance, in Lisbon, and at P.A.R.T.S., in Brussels, and completed his choreographic studies between exerce, in Montpellier, and the Institute for Applied Theater Studies, in Giessen.

Since 2008, he articulates his practice between producing work and collaborating as a dancer with other artists such as Ana Rita Teodoro, Eszter Salamon, Moriah Evans and Xavier Le Roy. His work is characterized by a diversity of apparatuses that invest in the production of conflicts between the subject who dances and the danced object. His pieces are usually developed in collaboration with other artists such as in Anthroposcenes (2017) with Rita Natálio and Pedro Neves Marques, and Where is the Coat? (2018) with Cyriaque Villemaux and Ana Jotta.

Since 2017 he has expanded his practice to other parallel formats. He curated the cycle New—Old Dance in Santarém, with performances, workshops, conversations and exhibitions; created alongside Ana Bigotte Vieira a device for a collective historicity of dance in Portugal – For a Timeline to Be — and founded a journal — Coreia — dedicated to the discourse produced by works and artists, in close relationship to dance.

Confirmed artists and speakers

Ana Jotta (PT), Ana Pi (BR), Ana Rita Teodoro (PT), Antonia Baehr (DE), Christine de Smedt (BE), Christophe Wavelet (FR), Chrysa Parkinson (US/SE), Eszter Salamon (HU), Fred Moten (US), Joana Sá (PT), João Fiadeiro (PT), Latifa Laâbissi (FR), Moriah Evans (US), Paula Caspão (PT), Pedro Barateiro (PT), Rita Natálio (PT), Scarlet Yu (HK), Vera Mantero (PT), Xavier le Roy (FR).

Participants

Alina Ruiz Folini (AR), Aline Combe (FR), Bianca Zueneli (IT), Emily Barasch (US), Isadora Alves (PT), Isis Andreatta (BR), Julián Pacomio (ES), Laura Ríos (CU), Laure Fleitz (FR), Leire Aranberri (ES), Maria Abrantes (PT), Marina Silva / Dubia (BR), Natália Mendonça (BR), Randy Reyes (US/GT), Sara Vieira Marques (PT), Suiá Ferlauto (BR).

Showings

  • Cycle of presentations in Lisbon, scheduled to take place in July 2020, as part of a programming cycle at the Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation.

PACAP4 Activities