Welcome to my blog. You will find here some news and texts that come side by side to my artistic activities as choreographer, dancer and performer.

Showing posts with label brut. Show all posts
Showing posts with label brut. Show all posts

Saturday, 16 March 2013

SUBSTITUTE SHOW at imagetanz

SUBSTITUTE SHOW will be presented on Monday and Tuesday (18 & 19 March) at brut/Konzerthaus at 20:00.
It's a new solo by Radek Hewelt.


 photo: Łukasz Unterschuetz

In Substitute show, Polish performer Radek Hewelt embarks on a personal journey back in time into his past and ends up in communist Poland. The political and economic crisis has a tight grip on the country, but the young man’s ardent wish to found a punk band is stronger. The only problem: an electric guitar is neither to be found nor affordable. Necessity is the mother of invention, so a tennis racket is simply converted into an instrument which magical sounds can be charmed out of. Twenty five years later, again in crisis-torn times, Radek Hewelt remembers such almost forgotten skills – not to make a guitar this time, but to create a performance.

More information on the website of brut:
http://www.brut-wien.at/programm/detail/876/en/

Thursday, 7 March 2013

"Substitute Show" at imagetanz in Vienna

"Substitute Show" - a new piece by Radek Hewelt


The premiere of Substitute Show will take place on 18 March 2013 at 20:00 in brut/Konzerthaus in Vienna. The performance will be shown also on 19 March at 20:00 in the same location. Both shows will be presented within imagetanz festival.


 photo: Łukasz Unterschuetz                                       


In Substitute show, Polish performer Radek Hewelt embarks on a personal journey back in time into his past and ends up in communist Poland. The political and economic crisis has a tight grip on the country, but the young man’s ardent wish to found a punk band is stronger. The only problem: an electric guitar is neither to be found nor affordable. Necessity is the mother of invention, so a tennis racket is simply converted into an instrument which magical sounds can be charmed out of. Twenty five years later, again in crisis-torn times, Radek Hewelt remembers such almost forgotten skills – not to make a guitar this time, but to create a performance.


Concept and performance: Radek Hewelt  
Dramaturgical advice: Filip Szatarski

A-co-production of imagetanz/brut Wien and Visitores – Association for the projection of artistic ideas. The work came into being as part of the project Europe in Motion. A work-in-progress was presented at the Springdance Festival 2012 in Utrecht (Netherlands) and in Teatr w Oknie in Gdansk (Poland).

Links:
http://www.brut-wien.at/programm/detail/876/en/
https://www.wien.gv.at/vadb/internet/AdvPrSrv.asp?Layout=VAErgebnis_neu&Type=K&ID=324509&return=

Thursday, 18 March 2010

Helmut Ploebst in derStandard about Empathy Project vol 1

A review from the derStandard by Helmut Ploebst after our Empathy Project vol. 1 at imagetanz in brut/Vienna. For full text follow the link: http://derstandard.at/1268700946217/Imagetanz-Tanz-als-Einfuehlungsdroge
A text is in german.


Imagetanz

Tanz als Einfühlungsdroge

18. März 2010, 17:31

Die Choreografinnen Magdalena Chowaniec und Martina Ruhsam

Wien - Der Mund steht ihnen offen, als hätten sie den Leibhaftigen gesehen und dabei eine Maulsperre bekommen. Die drei Tänzer des "Empathy Project Vol. I" der jungen Choreografin Magdalena Chowaniec, das bei Imagetanz im Brut-Theater uraufgeführt wurde, sind Süchtige.

Besser gesagt: Diese Tänzer versetzen sich mit unheimlicher Konsequenz in die beschädigten Körper von Drogenabhängigen. Sie dröhnen sich nicht selbst zu, sondern bereiten ihre Aufführungen stundenlang vor. Durch Einfühlung, als Ergebnis einer langen künstlerischen Recherche. Seit 2008 beschäftigt sich Chowaniec mit den Wirkungen von Empathie im Tanz, deren politischen Aspekt die aus Polen stammende Künstlerin besonders unterstreicht.

Das Ergebnis ist kein Sozialrührstück, sondern eine choreografische Installation von beinahe Beckett'schen Ausmaßen. Die drei Figuren torkeln auf dem Tanzboden, versuchen in ihrem Weggetretensein so etwas wie ein Bühnenbild aufzubauen. Da sie kaum noch fähig sind, sich auf den Beinen zu halten oder einfachste Handlungen auszuführen, geraten sie in einen Teufelskreis vergeblicher Bemühungen.

Chowaniec, die mit Gabri M. Einsiedl und einem umwerfenden Radek Hewelt auch selbst auftrat, verunsicherte die sozial sensible Imagetanz-Zuschauerschaft durch ihre Gratwanderung zwischen künstlerischer Illusion und dokumentarischem Realismus. Geradezu perfekt wäre das "Empathy Project Vol. I" auch für ein junges Publikum - durch das Fehlen aller Belehrungsattitüde, durch Ironie trotz Drastik der Darstellung.

[...]

Diesem Erfolg schadet es natürlich keinesfalls, dass das Brut zurzeit gerade das "hottest theatre in town" ist und dass die Kuratorin des Festivals - Bettina Kogler - auch auf die einladenden Gesten künstlerischer Partyformate gesetzt hat.

(Helmut Ploebst, DER STANDARD/Printausgabe, 19.03.2010)


Saturday, 20 February 2010

Radek Hewelt's 'Soft Cowboy' in 'THINGS'

Dear friends,
I was asked by Anat Steinberg to contribute in curated by her exhibition of performances in big second hand shopping paradise Carla mittersteig in Vienna.
For this occasion I've prepared a performances called 'Soft Cowboy'. I'd feel honoured and excited to see you there!
The premiere is on Wednesday 24th February. Details below.



Soft Cowboy / Radek Hewelt

At this point in his life, Radek Hewelt has very little material property and even less personal attachments towards it. As a danced his most important possession is his body. Especially for this event, Radek Hewelt decided to rent his body + soul for artistic purposes. He signed a legal rental contract, and for a period of 81 days he abandoned the ownership of his property (the body + soul mentioned above). He gave the renter (the artistic purpose) the full rights to dispose of the ‘body + soul’ in any way necessary, including its modification (to create a new image), destruction of ‘real self’ and experimenting with exterior guidelines for interiors. In the performance (i.e. the artistic purpose) he will present his new creation.



‘THINGS’

24,25,26 February at 19:00
performances take place at Carla mittersteig,
Mittersteig 10, 1050 Vienna


‘THINGS’ is an exhibition for performances. It reflects upon the relationship between constructing identity and owning property; who we think we are in relation to the things we have.. or should probably get some day.. the people we should be.. the possibilities .. we should have had .. by now..

The artists Otobong Nkanga, Hans Bryssinck and Radek Hewelt are invited to respond with new performance works; from Egyptian mummies (buried with their valuables) through obsessive restitution wars to brand fetishes or the economical / emotional process of buying a house.. The artists will explore the emotional link connecting property owned and/or desired, and identity presentation.

To accentuate the economical aspect of the theme, ‘THINGS’ is happening in a second-hand furniture shop (Carla mittersteig, Mittersteig 10, Wien), which will be open for shopping during the show.

Curated and orchestrated by Anat Stainberg. With contributions from the artists: Hans Bryssinck, Performance. Yasmina Haddad, styling. Radek Hewelt, Performance. Erwin Jans, dramaturgy. Jan Maertens, light. Otobong Nkanga, Performance. Martin Siewert, music. and Ina Ivanceanu, production.

‘THINGS’ is a co-production of Anat Stainberg / ‘Mediated Meetings’ and brut Wien, and is kindly supported by stadt Wien Kultur and the BMU:KK Austria.

THINGS in Vienna

Curated and orchestrated by Anat Steinberg.

With contributions from the artists:

Hans Bryssinck, Performance
Yasmina Haddad, styling
Radek Hewelt, Performance
Erwin Jans, dramaturgy
Jan Maertens, light
Otobong Nkanga, Performance
Martin Siewert, music

‘THINGS’ is a site specific performance. It reflects upon the relationship between identity construction and property. Focusing on the gap between ‘wanting’ and ‘getting’; who we think we are in relation to the things we have.. or should probably get some day.. the people we should be.. the possibilities .. we should have had by now..

'THINGS'
is happening in the Carla mittersteig, a second-hand furniture warehouse in Vienna. The Carla Mittersteig is mainly (according to the people who run it) a social project for employment (by Caretas). But it is chosen for the performance because of its arbitrary and sustained collection of ‘things with history and possible future’, reviving many forgotten stories. Site-specific performances are created in relation to a specific location and exist only there. This specific medium offers the viewers ‘pre knowledge’ to start with, which adds layers of information to the reading of the performance. And since a site (in this case a second hand public shop) is real and has a daily function, the performance gets to play in the range between reality and fiction in a fascinating way. To accentuate the economical aspect of the theme the shop will be open for shopping during the show.



Jeremy Bentham (1748–1832) an English philosopher and legal theorist developed legislation theory dealing with owned property in the early ninteenth century. He was the first to address property’s important emotional components in his theories, revealing that property represented not only the object or item possessed, but indicated a more intangible relationship between the owner and what was owned.
‘Property is nothing but a basis of expectation; the expectation of deriving certain advantages from a thing which we are said to possess [. . .]. It is not material, it is metaphysical; it is a mere conception of the mind.’

To continue this thought it is interesting to look at the way people (in western cultures) develop relationship with the things they have; the how people belong to their property, how property defines people, puts them in a specific social status, how people live in the promise of the things they potentially should get some day .. Further more Bentham reminds, that it is law alone that enables property to exist, and that from this law people draw a certain expectation also towards future profit or an anticipated inheritance.
The time it takes until the promise has been realized is a very fruitful one for the creation of fantasies, because all you can do is plan, construct an identity.

THINGS, is a research into the way our imaginary and real potentialities code the way of our reality construction. The way fantasy is processed in a brain and re-arranged to an identity with reference to our physical, social and cultural surroundings. The performance will explore the function of property in sparking both individual and collective strategies, and propose ways for these stored ideas to be ‘back-projected’ to the space that hosts them - a second-hand furniture warehouse.



Three artists are invited to participate in this performance; each is coming from different culture and artistic background. All were personally and artistically challenged by the suggestion to explore the link between property and identity; they are asked to look at the ways in which matter influences spirit and contribute their own input, their own ‘take’ on things.

The artists will be provided with research material collected by Anat Stainberg from which they could choose what to focus on. From Egyptian mummies (buried with their valuables) through obsessive restitution wars to brand fetish or the economical / emotional process of buying a house. The artists are asked to create scenes in varies media considering the aspect of their choice.

‘THINGS’ is a co-produced by brut Wien and is kindly supported by stadt Wien Kultur and the BMU:KK Austria.

Monday, 21 December 2009

"Empathy project, vol 1" in Pinkafeld


Empathy project. Vol 1. on the way! The premiere will take place during imagetanz festival in brut in March 2010. We have made a research between drug-addicts on Karlsplatz and now a residency in Pinkafeld/Burgenland...
Project is initiated and led by Magdalena Chowaniec.

Few words about the project:

‘I look for a role that hopefully I feel empathy with and that I can understand and love, but also that has that challenge for me to play - a different kind of role, a different type of character, a different time period.’
Kathy Bates

‘Bodies of drug addicts on Karlsplatz became to me highly inspirational in all their ambivalent existence. The way they inspired me, and the admiration I started to share for their incredible bodily capabilities, occurred very paradoxal - in all its misery becoming almost poetic to my eyes.’
Magdalena Chowaniec

Empathy Project puts the phenomena of empathy in the center of interest and questions the importance of empathy our days, it looks for the possibilities of bridging the social and artistic, abstract on a ‘new’ empathic level. In ‘Vol. I’ reflections upon the outsiders lead to the questions about what's allowed, acceptable and what inappropriate in the society of theatre trying to turn excluded into exclusive. ‘Vol. I’ examines the methods, possibilities and effects of empathizing with the excluded ones through the process based at first on a search for a common empathy in a group. Three human beings turn into a ‘human tabula rasa’. Crossing the border between life and theatre, they rush through the world and melt with different surroundings becoming a part of various landscapes. They look for a ‘homeless esthetics’ in art, taking another point of view onto life – practicing homelessness, performing junkies, researching physicality of the rejected ones.


Participants:
Concept: Magdalena Chowaniec (PL/A)
Research/Creation/Performance: Gabri Einsiedl (A), Magdalena Chowaniec (PL/A), Radek Hewelt (PL/A)
Technical help/Sound: Vladi Tchapanov (BLG/A)

Links:
www.mariamagdalena.cc
www.myspace.com/rockthemob
www.madamlena.blogspot.com

Friday, 27 November 2009

"ICH STERBE. I'M DYING. Я умираю" by Toxic Dreams at brut/Vienna

brut presents now (25-29.11.2009) a new piece by Toxic Dreams: "ICH STERBE. I'M DYING. Я умираю". I have had a pleasure to participate in this production performing in a film (a part of the whole evening show) a role of russian student Lev Rabenek who was witnessing a death of Chekhov.

From a web-site of Toxic Dreams:

For the last installment of the Realism or Uncle Vanya we take a detour; instead of another deconstruction of the play, we tell a different story, the story of Chekhov's death. The famous writer died in 1904; since then the facts, concerning his death, are told, and told, in a way that will make him turn in his grave.

How did Chekhov die? Why can't we get a realistic description of what really happened in his death bed, in a hotel room in Germany? How come, a writer that so insisted on describing life the way it is, cannot get a proper description of his death the way it was?

The story of Chekhov's death is a Rashomon worthy of Kurosawa. The story of his death and the way it was viewed, the subjectivity of the observer, serves as ironic contra point to the so called objectivity of Chekhov's writing. What is real in the realism of Chekhov's death, and how speech can describe it is the center of the performance.

(http://www.toxicdreams.at/)


Filmcast Cezary Tomaszewski (Anton P. Tschechow), Irene Coticchio (Olga Knipper), Anna Mendelssohn (Autorin), Otmar Wagner (Doktor Schwöhrer), Radek Hewelt (Leo Rabeneck), Justin Poole (Portier)
Voiceovers
Evgeniia Lianskaya, Lena Kvadrat, Wolfgang Weitlaner, Oleg Soulimenko, Justin Poole, Samuel Machto, Olivier Brasselet
Live Cast Cezary Tomaszewski (Anton P. Tschechow), Anna Mendelssohn (Autorin)
Hausbau und Kameras
Yosi Wanunu, Otmar Wagner, Claribel Koss und Michael Strohmann
Komposition, Film- und Live Editing
Michael Strohmann
Haus
Otmar Wagner
Regieassistenz
Claribel Koss
Text und Regie
Yosi Wanunu
Produktion Kornelia Kilga


Links:
http://www.brut-wien.at/start.php?navid=detail&id=329
http://www.toxicdreams.at/
http://ongoing.nightmares.toxicdreams.at/wordpress/ich-sterbe/

Sunday, 15 November 2009

GOOD NIGHT & GOOD LUCK. First Vienna Dance Night.

GOOD NIGHT & GOOD LUCK. First Vienna Dance Night.

Info from web-site of TQW (http://tqw.at/en/node/31&date=10.10.2009):

Ewa Bankowska, Milli Bitterli/ artificial horizon, Andrea Bold/ Tanzverein Erdberg, Magdalena Chowaniec, Cie. Willi Dorner, Super Nase & Co., Liquid Loft and others

On 10 October the Museumsquartier is totally under the sign of the First Vienna Dance Night. The Tanzquartier and the brut Wien are curating this already internationally successful format together, and are thereby creating an annual occasion for the audience and all participants to encounter the Austrian dance and performance scene.

Pieces and sketches, installations, media compositions, performative concerts and venue-specific works, as well as a lounge in which to party and swap ideas are available for the most diverse concepts and facets of the choreographic, and in one night give an intensive and compact insight into the breadth of international dance creation in Vienna – from already created productions, to current processes, to not-yet-realised ideas. Included in this, when the spectators are encouraged as observers or participants to fight their own way through the programme landscape and move back and forth through the various venues, are: the Studios and Hall G of the Tanzquartier, Dschungel Wien, the Leopold Museum, Quartier 21 and other venues in the Museumsquartier.

In the coming year, the brut Wien will be the venue for the joint dance marathon, which is supported by the Ministry for Education, Art and Culture, and which aims to make a contribution to the further networking of the Austrian dance and performance scene.


A cooperation between the Tanzquartier Wien and the brut Wien, in cooperation with Dschungel Wien, Raum D / quartier21, Museum Leopold and the Museumsquartier. With the support of the Ministry for Education, Art and Culture.



I had a pleasure to performe in 2 pieces that night:

ANDREA BOLD / TANZVEREIN ERDBERG (A)

Gesäänge

Idea: Andrea Bold
performance: David Ender, Radek Hewelt, Martin Tomann, Cezary Tomaszewski
lighting: Edgar Aichinger
costumes: Linda Redlin

With Sang & Schmacht: the HerrenGesangsVerein surrenders to its own flannel. With devotion it submits to the inevitability with which we stage the grand business of life and death; with pleasure it tastes the fraud of its own romanticising.
This time without the fallacy of the announced pure being, what a relief.
A co-production by Andrea Bold/Tanzverein Erdberg and Brut Wien. With the support of the Cultural Department of the City of Vienna and ttp I WUK.

Biographies

Andrea Bold came to Vienna from Cologne and since then has been operating in the fields of classical piano playing, performance, choreography and motherhood.

David Ender born in Wodonga, lives in Vienna. Writer, musician, performer, translator. Does a lot.

Radek Hewelt came to Vienna from Gdansk through Bratislava, Brussels and Barcelona.
Is staying. Lives and works a lot.

Martin Tomann. Vienna.

Cezary Tomaszewski born in Warsaw, lives in Vienna. Dancer, performer, choreographer, theatre studies scholar, musician. Very talented, plus other hobbies.

Since 1999 the TANZVEREIN ERDBERG has dedicated itself to leaping, flattery, soup and other things.



EWA BANKOWSKA / DENSEGROUP (POL/A)

dancing to songs (special version)

Idea and direction: Ewa Bankowska
performance: Radek Hewelt, Amanda Piña, Ewa Bankowska
lighting: Siegfried Kern
production assistance: Rosa John
Première: brut Konzerthaus Imagetanz Festival, 4 March 2009 (Performance: Radek Hewelt, Amanda Piña, Tanja Boppart, Dominique Richards, Ewa Bankowska)

“The Polish choreographer Ewa Bankowska for example turns round the idea of what Dancing to Songs means: certainly not to make ‘a good figure’. Dancing is a physical process that does not primarily exist to fulfil some kind of taste criteria. In dancing the body lets its spirit out.” (Helmut Ploebst / Der Standard, 13.3.2009)
http://www.densegroup.blogspot.com/

A co-production by Densegroup with Imagetanz/Brut Wien. With the support of the cultural department of the city of Vienna, the Ministry for Education, Arts and Culture and Dans.Kias in the framework of a residency.

Biographies

Radek Hewelt was born in Poland in 1973. He studied dance and choreography at PARTS. He has been living and working in Vienna since 2003. He has worked as a dancer and performer with: Leszek Bzdyl, Thierry de Mey, Lynda Gaudreau, Cristian Duarte, Elio Gervasi, Sebastian Prantl, Katarzyna Kozyra, Cezary Tomaszewski, Matsune & Subal, Editta Braun, Rebecca Murgi, Pathosbüro, Andrea Bold and Ewa Bankowska. In addition he creates his own works, including: Zoom in, 21 minutes, About a boy, Close-up, Tonight’s Tune.

Amanda Piña (Vienna) was born in Chile. She studied physical theatre in Chile and contemporary dance and choreography in Barcelona, Salzburg and Montpellier, (Ex.e.r.ce, dir. Mathilde Monnier). Her works include her own choreographies, which have been performed at various festivals and stages in Europe.
As a dancer she has worked, among others, with Ewa Bankowska and DD. Dorvillier, and Human Future Dance Corps. Since 2005 she has been collaborating with the fine artist Daniel Zimmermann; together they founded Nadaproductions.

Siegfried Kern is a cabaret artist, actor and winner of the Salzburg Speaking Prize in the Scouts’ House in 2001. In addition he has proved himself as a lighting and sound designer in the works Enter and Space by Ewa Bankowska.

Ewa Bankowska (Vienna/Salzburg) was born in Poland. She completed a professional training in dance and choreography at SEAD (Salzburg Experimental Academy of Dance). Since 2006 she has written her own works (Enter, Space, Dancing to Songs). In addition she works with Nadaproductions and Kabinett Ad Co. The artist’s current work will be premièred at the Tanz-House Herbst in Salzburg in November 2009.

Links:
http://tqw.at/en/node/31&date=10.10.2009
http://www.densegroup.blogspot.com/