Songs of the Body is an action of multiple activations through contemporary dance, free movement and improvisation, which will take place from 1 to 12 August in the public space of Heraklion, Crete with the participation of female artists.

The dancers apart from taking over the public space, they take the audience, locals or visitors – all of them passers-by- by surprise, for a few minutes, as they are unaware of the performance, they do not know whether it is planned, an improvisation, or a spontaneous reaction of one of their counterparts, local or visitor, yet passers-by all of them.

Why dance without music? Why dance without the dancers standing out? What is the connection between dance and space? How does an improvisation, deprived of props, seek to find them in a one of the city’s landmarks?

Too often, we cross the city in a hurry, without paying attention to spots considered neutral, or again, we label landmarks as they are, obeying a one dimensional function. Lions Square, the Koules Fortress, the Tomb of Nikos Kazantzakis. And sometimes, these spots are our own landmarks. The bench of the first kiss, the walked, re-walked alley on our way to work, the garden of a museum, the low wall when we can have a few-minutes rest in our middle-aged lives. It is the place, the space, on the one hand, and the dances of emotions of the moment and the emotions we will recall in the future, on the other.

Thus, the answer is given by the dancers themselves, as they know how to interact and “sing” with the body, to “sing” either their joy or their pain.

CONTRIBUTORS

Dancers | Mika Kefalogianni, Eleftheria Komi, Olia Lydaki, Georgia Petrali, Evita Tsakalaki, Vivie Filippidi

Artwork | Chrysanthi Koumianaki (envelope with 5 unpublished dance scores between 2019 -2024)

Letter | Melissanthi Giannousi

Songs of the Body is supported by NEON through its annual Grants Scheme.