The negative utopia becomes positive

Tanznetz, 23.12.2018 // Author: Karl-Peter Fürst

„If endurance is the only thing that we can win, then we are losers”: this optical and verbally progressive analysis raises questions about the loss of autonomy and motivation, about the why, about the what for, and about one’s own feelings in the process. But the dancers continue to move intensely, and the suggestion of a negative utopia becomes positive. Even though Sahru Huby shakes her head like a plastic dog in the back of a car and demonstrates how she transforms into things or a toy… But as the others take up the movement, something like a modern dance sequence is created that, projected like a kaleidoscope, overlaps at a high tempo. Music and movement are often an astonishing match, and developing dance forms from uncontrolled moments of failure is impressive. We know where the movement comes from. The authenticity is spectacularly emphasized when all dancers hold their unstable positions while a sports reporter produces his play-by-play and innumerous projections from the exterior world change in a matter of seconds. (…) In total: a strong appeal by Anna Konjetzky and her very alert and then exhausted dancers (in addition to Sahra Huby: Sooyeon Kim, Maxwell McCarthy, Quindell Orton and Robin Rohrmann) not to hold on to predetermined directives, but to be present in order to use a moment of decision autonomously.

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Are you balancing, or are you falling already?

KULTUR-EXTRA online, 22.12.2018 // Author Petra Hermann

(…) One could be excited about her newest piece – and is fascinated from the very beginning: On the barren, dark stage with minimalist music, three female dancers and two dancers, a microphone and an iPhone. The five stand on the balls of their feet, one points to the other, for minutes. Even watching it is exhausting. A slight swaying. When will the first stop standing upright? When will he or she lose balance, stagger? When will one feel ill? Questions that the moderator also poses and with which he opens the dance/game. In its course, everyone experiments, dances for themselves and against each other, goes to their limits, films each other – and thus reflects on basic human needs. “Standing tall”, for example. One of the dancers holds her position endlessly. But her hold, precisely her upright position, also conceals her fear. Fear of getting a cramp, of a tendon tearing, farting, even that she might swallow the microphone – which would end her career. She would then be condemned to watch Netflix series for the rest of her life. This is not without its own humor and deep meaning.

(…) The measure of all things: the vertical. It also means standstill, a painful stance on the balls of your feet, the point of departure for this remarkable installation. In the process: no broad perspective, no horizon – no horizontal! Is falling truly the same as failing, falling the same as weakness? Isn’t there strength in fragility as well? Is there life without movement, but in perfection? Questions of humanity, cleverly posed to us with humor – and to the physical abilities of five magnificent dancers. Thank you, Anna Konjetzky!

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“The Very Moment” in Kammer 3 of the Münchner Kammerspiele

Abendzeitung München, 21.12.2018 // Author Vesna Mlakar

Shortly before Christmas, let’s sharpen our focus on people’s weak sides. The content-driven Munich choreographer Anna Konjetzky is successful and convincing with her world premiere “The Very Moment” in Kammer 3 of the Münchner Kammerspiele. (…)

The efficacy and fragility of physical functions are questioned in a clever, vivid and remarkably complex way. And this makes the evening – in which dance is not the point, but rather research for perception – worthwhile. It’s logical that Konjetzky abandons all form at the end. Her crew loses concentration and stance, and finally flounders about on mats, self-immersed. It is a calculated collapse of exterior structure and externally determined expectations. Good.

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This piece allows the view of the world through the body

Bayerische Rundfunk Kulturwelt, 21.12.2018 // Author Katharina Huebel-Gohr

(…) One of the best moments is: when the five dancers don’t dance. The stand-still – in the true sense of the word – becomes an extreme physical experience: the dancers freeze on the balls of their feet, one of the human body’s smallest possible surfaces to stand on. The goal: not to move. Quindell Orton is the “pro endurance dancer” – her immobile solo, a speaking tableau, takes around five minutes. She reports of burning joints and a sweat-drenched back, and she knows how to describe worst-case scenarios in an amusing way. (…)

An anatomically magnificent and varied Sahra Huby, who manages to create true dance from the physical experiment while bringing together scientific interest into movement and body flow. (…) Instead of schadenfreude: the joy of movement. Anna Konjetzky contrasts sensual staggering and stumbling with the battle against one’s own body: “The very Moment” is rich in discoveries and stimulating. It is a piece of intelligent, precise dance theater.

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