Description
The new piece by the London-based hip-hop star is a dark adventure, a story of resistance and change. A lone warrior leads her group of wandering nomads through changing times while longing for belief, for a way into the light that penetrates from above into their gloomy arena. The music, with its hard rhythms and guttural sounds, sets the undulating style, the dance intensifies into hard and raw movements, distancing itself from commercialised hip-hop. This raw, intense dance challenges the soul of the dancers, whose pain is only released in a kind of trance.
Feathered armour and dragon scales suggest rebels growing beyond their former existence as colonized bodies. Lances of light flash in their battle against a darkness that simply will not yield. The sometimes almost fantastical figures remain elusive, suddenly appearing in bright spots of light, sometimes providing a glimpse into an outer, hidden world. Perhaps it is all just a nightmare before the titular sleep comes... Until We Sleep pits hope against the burden of responsibility. In this intense piece, Botis Seva, who was last in Stuttgart with BLKDOG, continues to explore themes of discrimination and racial conflict in our contemporary world.
Dauer: approx. 70 minutes no intermission
Age guidance: from 12 years
Their story is one of perseverance. It can be interpreted as a reference to colonial violence and the slave trade, or to wars and flight, or as the tale of a psyche that fortifies itself with imagination against fragmentation. — Kölner Stadtanzeiger
A bit like the heroic journeys you see in films. Until we sleep is a reflection on leadership, the ways in which you can fulfill it, and finding the balance between leading a community and also granting it its own responsibility. — NRC
Until We Sleep seems built to intrigue and perplex the viewer, taking us on a voyage to a dark and somewhat scary place. It’s reflective of our time, the world is full of troubles and Botis Seva makes some bold choices in how he presents his tightly crafted vision. We watch the dancers seeking, battling and sharing, always in shadow, otherworldly shapes driven to move. — Fringe Review
Botis Seva, the most influential artist in contemporary dance today, is a phenomenal artist of unlimited emotional intelligence, innovative, demanding and exhausting physicality. — The National Herald
