Fest en Fest, an international festival of expanded choreography initiated and curated by H2DANCE, opens this month from 22 – 27 November, presenting choreographic work within galleries for the first time since its inception.
Feminism, gender, horror, queer culture and sexuality take centre stage in performances, exhibitions, discussions and gatherings in Cambridge, Colchester and Deptford, with work from artists spanning dance and visual art including Joe Moran, Halla Ólafsdóttir and Amanda Apetrea, and Marikiscrycrycry.
Kickstarting on Tuesday 22 November, the festival opens with an exhibition and performance called Its contours, Its movements by British-Irish artist and choreographer Joe Moran, Artistic Director of Dance Art Foundation, whose practice incorporates performance, critical writing, drawing, curation and advocacy projects. Taking place at APT Gallery, the exhibition surrounds a series of spray paint drawings created by Joe, alongside his films Materiality Will Be Rethought and Something Necessary and Useful from 22 – 23 November.
As part of the exhibition, the gallery will host performances of his work Thirst that sees two performers navigate a complex, shifting terrain of power, submission, complicity and consent. Taking place on Wednesday 23 November, the first performance starts at 5pm and the second follows at 7pm after Fest en Fest’s opening launch in the gallery at 6pm.
Halla Ólafsdóttir (Iceland) and Amanda Apetrea (Sweden) present Dead at Cambridge Junction on Tuesday 22 November to open the Cambridge strand of the festival.
Beauty and the Beast is a fake band, a dance performance, a party, a workshop, a movie and a lifelong collaboration between the choreographers Amanda Apetrea and Halla Ólafsdóttir and some of their friends; composers and musicians Zhala Rifat, Karin Dreijer and Linnéa Martinsson.
Their latest dance performance is called Dead; a pornographic poetry reading and dystopian dance performance that merges the beauty of darkness and high and low culture, whilst exploring ways of connecting with an audience that blurs the boundaries between performers and spectators.
GOING BERSERK by Marikiscrycrycry is a solo choreographic research strand sitting within a wider project looking towards the aesthetics and formal tools of horror making and the live context by choreographer and dancer marikiscrycrycry.
Known for their timely and political work that deals with gender, race, sexuality and subjectivity, GOING BERSERK follows a figure, the Goner, one who is lost beyond belief, further afield, unreachable, through the physical, emotional, and geographic states of lostness, and the fear that being in this state induces for the performer and for the audience. This will be performed at APT Gallery on Friday 25 November.
Fest en Fest will also feature two new works by Emilyn Claid. Emilyn Claid will be performing her work SKINNED made in collboration with Heidi Rustgaard and MATERIAL made in collaboration with Florence Peake on Saturday 26 November.
For the full line-up and more information about Fest en Fest visit the website. You can celebrate the festival opening at APT Gallery on Wednesday 23 November at 6pm.