RETRATS ERRANTS | Barcelona, the latest creation of Group LaBolsa, premiered at the theater Mercat de les flors in January 2021 and is the first chapter within a cycle of new “Express-Creations”. The second chapter UMHERIRRENDE PORTRÄTS | Salzburg will premiere in October 2021 within the frame of tanz_house festival 21. 

The act of portraying, as we know it from painting, photography, sculpture or audiovisual arts, sets an intimate frame for the individual and reveals their uniqueness. At the same time the portrait reveals the portraitist, their own interest, attention, obsessions and desire to exist within their work or through it. What do they hide? What do they allow to emerge?

With this creation cycle, the collective Group LaBolsa proposes a journey on the idea of a scenic portrait, which reflects on the sensitive human condition, the fragility of the individual within the collective and the need to belong to something beyond the individual.

After their first collective creation The Measure of Disorder in collaboration with the Swiss choreographer Thomas Hauert, Group LaBolsa found their natural next step already in 2016, when they refocused their exchange towards the development of a score based improvisation method, which serves real time creation on stage. Their inspiration for this decision lies in their own trajectories as dance makers, who focus on live composition as their main drive and also in the wish to further explore the methods of some of the artists, who have influenced them, such as Mal Pelo, Thomas Hauert, Lisa Nelson, Julyen Hamilton, Deborah Hey, Joao Fiadeiro, etc.  

In order to give room to the individual voices of the artists in Group LaBolsa they decide to work in chapters, guiding each other into different “Creations. Express” all of which investigate the idea of identity and construction of memory. 

Credits:

Idea, artistic direction : Group LaBolsa

Live creation : Natalia Jiménez, Mireia de Querol, Xavi Moreno, Federica Porello, Iris Heitzinger, Anna Rubirola, Cecilia Colacrai and Joana Serra.

Sound design: Federica Porello / Group LaBolsa

Light design : Joana Serra

Production: Rita Stivala

Scenography, costumes : Group LaBolsa

Outside eye: Company Mal Pelo

Video: Tristán Pérez-Martín

Photography : Tristán Pérez-Martín (apart from cover picture above by Benjamin Sommabere)

With the support of : Verein kunstHupferei/Salzburg, Mercat de les Flors Barcelona, l’animal a l’esquena, Cia. Mal Pelo, La Caldera Barcelona, La Visiva Barcelona

Thanks to: María Muñoz, Pep Ramis and Marine Budin.