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New and site-specific VerTeDance

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Author Kristina Durczaková
Spa. The place we choose to find pleasant feelings and relaxation. However, if we add the characteristic "a former spa", the idyllic concept begins to deteriorate. A spa left in a forlorn state, a raw space no one cares about. Due to the years of inactivity it has deteriorated so much that it probably can’t be helped. Yet VerTeDance company helped the basement of the former spa of Prague's Electric Transit Company at Vltavská to become a space for the premiere of their new site-specific project Learned helplessness. As a part of the 4 + 4 Days in Motion festival the project enlivened this both fascinating and uneasy feeling space with a work inspired by the atmosphere of communist camps from the 50s of the last century.
An exceptional and largely liberating element of site-specific projects is the ability to delete theatrical illusion and the distance between performer and spectator. We descend in a group to underground, where we get smiles from seven dancers leaning against the wall. The audience is free to move around, to watch from any angle, but it is not easy to become bold and forget the "stage-auditorium" convention when the performers gradually pour in throughout the rugged area to develop micro-stories in small rooms with sliding doors. If we want to see something, we have to follow them, peek into their world and be drawn into it. The initial atmosphere is pleasant, the couples move from their chambers into the hallway where they indulge in social dancing - gentlemen are elegant and ladies " chic" in beautiful dresses typical of the fifties. It is clear, however, that the idyll is not eternal, and even the space suggests this. Chipped corners, broken tiles and pervasive emptiness slowly begin to dominate. When we follow the dancers into another room full of fascinating nooks and crannies, it is clear that pretty dancing is over. The atmosphere thickens, frustrations, inner demons and hostile relations between the inhabitants of the area emerge on the surface. Dancers mix with the audience and even for them as performers it must be a challenge not to have a well-defined area separated by the fourth wall. Someone is dominant and someone must logically become a scapegoat. Veronika Kotlíková whom others give a lot of hard time pulls the Black Peter. Discomfort is enhanced by light and sound work - you can see the creators really worked with the space and inhabited it. Other more or less hidden actors who deepen the already sophisticated performance assist the main dancers - Veronika Kotlíková, Tereza Ondrová, Martina Hajdyla Lacová, Karolína Hejnová, Robert Nižník, Jaro Ondruš and Petr Opavský. 
Our stay at the "spa" cyclically closes with a scene resembling the initial one, but set in a different part of the maze with a different tone. We are then happy to be lead out of the depressing space, which nevertheless became home to a remarkable performance. VerTeDance score again! Written from the performance on 19th October 2013, Orco – Bubenská 1.
Learned helplessness
Music: Rafal Deťkos
Choreography: Veronika Kotlíková, Tereza Ondrová
Movement collaboration: Lali Ayguade Farro
Director: Jiří Havelka
Performers: Veronika Kotlíková, Tereza Ondrová  Martina Hajdyla Lacová , Karolína Hejnová, Robert Nižník, Jaro Ondruš  Petr Opavský, Katarina Ďuricová, Lucia Kašiarová, Jiří Havelka,Lali Ayguade Farro, Rafal Deťkos, Adriana Black, Tomáš Žižka and students
Production: VerTeDance, o.s., 4 + 4 Days in Motion festival
Premiere: 17th October 2013

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