• 1

• Dance-Performance + Audience Talk
• folkdances
• artificial intelligence

• Sa., 14.05.2022, 19:00

Audience Talk following 'KLOF. cyberographies of folk'

This Dance performance bringing folkdances into dialogue with artificial intelligence. The post performance talk offers deeper insights and behind the scenes, facilitated by Ana Letunić.

• 1the dancer Viktória Kőhalmi © Irina Demina (photo) & Yaron Maïm (computer animation).

Folk dances transmit a heritage of disciplining the bodies by framing them into representations of cultural identities. As we are acknowledging complexities and hybrid identities in our contemporary world, shouldn’t we rethink and hybridise the former “dances of the people” as well? The artist talk with Irina Demina and creative team of "KLOF", moderated by Ana Letunić, gives an inside into the creative process of the piece, relations between choreography and technology, folk dances and machine learning. The aim of the talk is an open discussion with the audience.

About the venue

Dock 11

The factory level of Dock 11 in Kastanienallee in Prenzlauer Berg is a rehearsals room, teaching studio and dance stage in one. The stage programme has interdisciplinary supplements such as theatre, performance, literature, music, visual art, film and club art – however the main focal point of every performance is on purely dance elements. Together with its other premises in EDEN***** in Berlin-Pankow, Dock 11 has established itself as an important part of the Berlin dance scene. The unique combination of teaching, rehearsal and stage generates an exciting change of perspectives in both the artists and pupils, as well as among the audience.  (source: visitberlin.de)

www.dock11-berlin.de  

About the Performance

KLOF. cyberographies of folk

Two dancing bodies on stage. One is a living machine – a human body. The other a programmed machine – an artificial intelligence.Both were trained in folk dances. One five years at the academic dance institution. The other one is a machine learning algorithm that has learned dozens of folk dances from around the world, and has been trained to choreo(cybero)graph synthetized “folk” dances on its own.
Folk dances transmit a heritage of disciplining the bodies by framing them into representations of cultural identities. As we are acknowledging complexities and hybrid identities in our contemporary world, shouldn’t we rethink and hybridise the former “dances of the people” as well? Can artificial intelligence help us to de-hierarchize and reinvent these inherited bodily practices?
With this work, Irina Demina continues her exploration of tradition and technology, as already laid out in her last pieces AcT II (2020) and Perpetual Myth (2021).

About the host

Ana Letunić

Ana Letunić is a contemporary performing arts and cultural policy researcher, curator and producer based between Zagreb, Croatia and Berlin, Germany. She graduated from the Master in International Performance Research at the University of Warwick and University of Arts Belgrade as well as specialized in “Kuratieren in den szenischen Künsten” at the Universities of Salzburg and LMU Munich. She has worked as a producer, curator, and dramaturgical advisor with contemporary performing arts organisations in Croatia, Germany, Serbia, UK, and USA as well as European networks such as Advancing Performing Arts Project (APAP), Nomad Dance Academy and Life Long Burning. As a researcher at the intersection of performance studies and cultural policy, she has participated in numerous international conferences, professional training, and research projects; edited books and authored articles translated into English, French, Turkish and German; and taught at universities in Croatia, Germany and Serbia. Currently, she works as a Docent at the Academy of Dramatic Arts in Zagreb, and is the director of the artistic organization “Mašina”, a collaborator on the “Tanz im August” festival, and a PhD candidate at the University of Arts in Belgrade (Faculty of Drama Arts), Serbia and at the University of Hildesheim (Faculty of Cultural Studies and Aesthetic Communication), Germany.