Over the last year Mike Rijnierse worked with choreographer Marina Mascarell and set designer Ludmila Rodrigues for the light and stage concept of “Valley”, a commissioned dance piece produced by GöteborgsOperan. The piece explores the notion of performativity, investigating how culture and nowadays social media dictate behavior, social roles and our expectations.
The stage and lights form an morphing architecture, drifting, emerging and collapsing in synergy with the choreography. The dance, the sound, the lightening were meticulously researched and crafted together inside the studios of the GöteborgsOperans Danskompani, in Gothenburg, Sweden.
Valley premiered on March 15th and was on view until April 14th, 2019 at GöteborgsOperan.
“Spanish choreographer Marina Mascarell creates political, intimate dance poetry with a fine attention to detail. Dagens Nyheter’s review of Mongrel (2015), her first work for GöteborgsOperans Danskompani, ran: A single body with harmoniously sweeping and airy swirling movements.”
In “Valley” the choreographer tackles a timeless issue: life as performance. Daily life follows a script in which we all play different roles. We do it so well that in the end life itself becomes a show, both for those who observe us and for ourselves. To further illustrate this theme, Marina Mascarell invited architect Ludmila Rodrigues and multimedia artist Mike Rijnierse, for together create theatrical rooms of light.
Team
Choreography: Marina Mascarell
Music: Ben Frost
Set design: Ludmila Rodrigues
Light design: Mike Rijnierse
Costume design: Daphna Munz
Sound design: Daniel Rejmer
Dramaturgy: Riikka Laakso
Choreography assistant: Nina Botkay
GöteborgsOperans Danskompani:
Benjamin Behrends, Takuya Fujisawa, Toby Kassell
Maxime Lachaume, Emilie Leriche, Michael Munoz