Press release LISA meets Sophie

Text by Thomas Frank, programmer Sophiensaele

LISA meets Sophie
Sophiensaele, Berlin, Thu 1 - Sun 4 June 2006

LISA is a group of young stage artists in Amsterdam, all of whom deal in their own original way with interdisciplinary forms of theatre. LISA is a frame for meeting and exchange, for the development of different models of producing, co-existing and engaging. LISA is artists Nicole Beutler, Paz Rojo, David Weber-Krebs, Ivana Müller and performer Hester van Hasselt. LISA will present their individual work for the first time together, in a shared context on the Sophiensaele Festsaal stage.

Strong individual work and ideas, freedom of independence combined with solidarity and awareness of community. The personal practice of the five LISA members is the key to surmount the individual approach and look for extended exchange and collaboration, between the five themselves but also with the larger performing and fine arts, theoreticians and others who share their interest in the world of art.
LISA is an initiative, a site for discussion, creates inspiration to start new projects and offers the means to produce. LISA is not a house, not a marketing label. Everything is dynamic, without a fixed place or a set time, always on the move: properly unachieved. One may call LISA a coherence in an open room.
This is of a strategic as well as an artistic interest. What distinguishes the work of all LISA members is the coherent affirmation of their self, the seriousness in the search for a meaningful expression on stage, far from psychological affectations or streamlined surfaces.

In Basic Dance Paz Rojo and Cristian Duarte enter into a negotiation on the utopian moments of meeting, friendship and possibility and on the dystopian moments of lye, violence and fixation. Paz Rojo performs her own choreography and offers it to Cristian Duarte with her wish to be translated. Behind the obvious gender difference two very individual kinds of self-affirmation appear on the empty stage. The dancers embody a choreographic relation that repeats and adapts. Which place is taken by the performer’s physical history in this process of production?

In the exact position of things Nicole Beutler stages the idea of the dissolution of knowledge in response to the phenomenon of the disease of Alzheimer. She looks into the possibilities of the construction of sense, ‘self’ and pleasure in the absence of memory.

In her lecture-performance How Heavy Are My Thoughts Ivana Müller plays with the concept of “thinking”, starting from the metaphors “heavy” and “light” thoughts. She constructs a piece about a woman who is trying to find the answer to the question: if my thoughts are heavier than usual is my head heavier than usual too.

David Weber-Krebs ‘ Fade Out starts exactly where other stories end. By manipulating a specific trope or mechanism of time based arts, it reverses the narrative logic and turns the end of a story into an epic of loss and longing that continuously balances on the borders of perception and disappearance.

One glance on the curricula of the LISA members shows it: here is a new generation of theatre directors who create an artistic homeland for themselves and a working context that meet the requirements of a new interdisciplinary and international production environment.

David Weber-Krebs (1974) studied french literature and religions sciences in Fribourg and Berlin . In 2002 he finished his studies at the mimeschool of the theater school in Amsterdam . His work is defined by an artistic quest for the metaphysical or the sublime paired with an almost obsessive interest in the material essence, the physical, the concrete. His theatre work connects room installations with choreography and refers to developments in art history.

Ivana Müller (1972) was born in Zagreb . She studied Comparative Literature and French Language in Zagreb and dance and choreography at the School for New Dance Development in Amsterdam . She makes pieces based on texts, videos, movements and dance in which she elaborates, in a rather witty way, on the relation of “self”, “body” and “mind”.

Paz Rojo (1974) has received her dance education in Spain, New York and Amsterdam where she graduated from the Amsterdam School of New Dance Development. Her work includes choreography, solo work and lectures performances.

Nicole Beutler (1969) studied Fine Arts at the Arts Academies of Münster and München and thereafter dance and choreography at the School for New Dance Development in Amsterdam . Her works include performances, installations and books. In her theatre work she focuses on the act of performance itself and on the dissolution of categories.

Hester van Hasselt (1971) from the Netherlands coordinates the LISA group. She attended Theater Schools in Brussels and Maastricht and performs in the productions of Nicole Beutler.

LISA meets Sophie: from the 1 st to 4 th of June the four productions will be shown: two on each evening. 1 and 2 June: the work of David Weber-Krebs and Ivana Müller, 3 and 4 June: the work of Paz Rojo and Nicole Beutler.

We would like to invite the public to join in the discussion with the artists after the performances on each night. On Sunday 4 June there will be furthermore an informal brunch with Berlin artists about strategies in collaboration and new forms of collectivism.

Bearing in mind that Sophiensaele has been created by a group of theatre artists ten years ago, it might be the right location for a new generation of theatre makers to show their work and present their ideas on artists collaboration.