PROJECT

Tactile Quartet(s)

In Tactile Quartet(s), Vera Tussing builds on her previous choreographic explorations in the sensory engagement of an audience. This time round, Tussing invites string quartet Quatuor MP4 to join four dancers on stage for a playful encounter between movement and sound. What if we take the movements of a string quartet seriously as a choreography – and dance along?

Four musicians play excerpts of multiple quartets from Franz Schubert, Anton Dvorak, Florence Price to contemporary works by Georg Friedrich Haas and Caroline Shaw. As the musicians engage in one-on-one tactile encounters with the audience members, they create a physical play back. Everything arises from touch – a bow on a string, an arm on a shoulder, a sound on your skin. The dancers mediate the encounter between musicality and tactility through a choreography that oscillates between the felt, the seen and the heard. At the point where the orbits of dance and music intersect, the audience is invited to enter into its kaleidoscopic score and asked to give a hand – or an arm.

Premiere: 19 and 20 October 2019 in Kaaitheater, Brussels

Vera Tussing

1982 ◊ DE, BE

www.veratussing.wixsite.com

Vera Tussing graduated from the London Contemporary Dance School, and has worked as a dancer, director and creator throughout Belgium, the UK, Canada and across Europe over the last 10 years. In 2011 she premiered Trilogy with Albert Quesada before going on to make the stage pieces You Ain't Heard Nothing Yet (2012) and T-Dance (2014), and the movement-sound installation Sound Bed. The performance, The Palm of Your Hand premiered in 2015 and Mazing in November 2016. In 2017 a recreation of The Palm of Your Hand, making the work accessible to blind and partially sighted audience members, premiered at CND in Paris. This piece is part of The Humane Body Project with ImPulsTanz (Vienna), Kaaitheater (Brussels) and The Place (London) as its partners. Both, Two, a duet in collaboration with Esse Vanderbruggen premièred at Kaaistudio's (Brussels) in 2018.

Credits

Creation and direction: Vera Tussing◊Co-creation and dance: Zoltan Vakulya, Yoh Morishita, Esse Vanderbruggen, Vera Tussing◊Co-creation and music: Quatuor MP4 (Claire Bourdet, Margaret Hermant, Pierre Heneaux, Merryl Havard)◊Musical collaboration and technical direction: Michael Picknett◊Rehearsal support: Bun Kobayashi◊Costume and set: Jivan van der Ende◊Contextual research and dramaturgy: JS Rafaeli and Sebastian Kann◊Production: Hiros◊Co-production: Kaaitheater◊Residencies: STUK, kunstenwerkplaats Pianofabriek, wpZimmer, workspacebrussels◊Supported by: Flemish Government◊In collaboration with : Universal Edition Wien, Auteursbureau ALMO Antwerpen◊Thank you: Clara Levy & Quartet partners for their extensive contribution to the research, Gorka Gurrutxaga Arruti, Ehren Verrelst, Arts Printing House Vilnius, Premiere Music Group◊Music excerpts: Anton Dvorak (String Quartet in F major, 1893) // Georg Friedrich Haas (Sting Quartet No2, 1998) // Florence Price (String Quartet in G Major, 1929) // Caroline Shaw (Entr'acte, 2011) // Franz Shubert (String Quartet No. 14 in D minor, 1831) // Michael Picknett (original score created in collaboration with Quatuor MP4)