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Interview with Israel Galván,
dancer:
"I like people to see me as a
piece of rubbish on stage"
Silvia Calado Olivo. Jerez, March, 2002
He arrived at the dressing-room of the Villamarta Theater in Jerez dissatisfied
with his performance with Gerardo Nuñez' trio the night of March 4th, 2002:
"I can never take it easy". Israel Galván tells himself that
"the love-hate relationship I have with dance is to blame". Perhaps
the same relationship the dancer from Seville might have with his audience. His
approach, which is nothing more than his personality, has almost as many followers
as critics. And so aware is he of this that he admits that his movements provoke
as much praise as disgust.
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Israel Galván (Photo: Daniel Muñoz)
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You're billed as the Nijinsky of flamenco dance, as an innovator, experimental...
¿is this something you actively seek or is it your personality?
I don't deliberately try for it, no. You can tell when something is forced.
I feel good dancing beyond the edge. It's not that I have a strategy, nor have
I decided to be more avant-garde than anyone else. It just comes out that way.
I also think the artist's mood within the art - in this case flamenco dance -
is decisive. I know I'm not the typical flamenco dancer whose only point of reference
is flamenco dance, but that doesn't mean that I want to innovate or fuse with
modern forms. What I think, what's in my head, there are many images, many body
movements, many possibilities within the music.
Despite the way your approach breaks molds, the roots are plenty solid.
In fact, you come from the Seville school.
If I get involved in something new or innovative or which has never been done,
it always starts from the roots. I'll give you an example. When I made 'La Metamorfosis'
I based each piece on different dancers. I took from Vicente Escudero, from Enrique
el Cojo...because I saw fragments of the book in their personalities. When the
situation called for the insect to be jumping for example, I always resorted to
Farruco's energy.
Have you settled in to the role of 'rare bird'?
The fact is, I like to dance, and once in a while grab people with some unusual
move. It's a great dialogue with the audience. But I also like people
to see me as a piece of rubbish on stage. I enjoy provoking those feelings from
the stage. And that gives me useful experience. I don't think there's any flamenco
dancer, as far as I know, who when he goes out on stage wants people to say "how
disgusting". I value that kind of reaction.
Do you prefer to win over that majority, or stick to the minority who understand
you?
Above all else, I want to feel good about myself. I'd like, after a time, to
have my own audience, because that will give me continuity. By force of logic,
I understand that when they see my radical approach, people are turned off. The
same thing I feel when I watch the TV show 'Operación Triunfo'. I say "what
rubbish" when I see that extreme commercialism. I get the picture and just
turn off the TV. I realize that half the audience will leave when they see me,
but that's the approach I want to use.
Israel Galván (Photo: Daniel Muñoz)
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What are the objectives have you in mind for developing your career?
I don't make plans, I take it one day at a time. Logically, as time passes,
you get ideas, and as they develop, I'll change as well. But on a regular basis
I don't make plans like that in a certain number of years I'll make a company
or anything like that. We'll see what comes out.
To make a company when you have such a personal way of dancing, that's no
easy task...
If I made a group, it wouldn't be a corps de ballet, but rather I would try
to create situations with different individuals. It would never be the typical
Spanish dance and flamenco company.
Some older dancers complain that the new generation is losing its way...
I think that right now you've got everything. Today for example, three of us
have danced [the program included 'Mano a mano' with Andrés Marín
and Rafael Campallo] and each one has his own world. Rafaelito is closest to traditional
dance, so it's not as if all the young people are doing strange things. El Pipa
is also keeping to that line. I think we young people who dare to do other things
do them because having gone to school, having Internet, DVD, seeing movies...living
today's life doesn't give you the same references. All that influences you. It's
not the same as an artist from before who went to the fiestas, to the tablao and
later on to the theater. Even so, I look at Mario Maya's choreographies and his
ideas and postures and I think that some flamencos in his day must have said "what's
this guy doing?" I've drawn from Mario myself. I only hope that when I'm
as old as they are, there'll be young people doing things and I can say "this
is no good". I think there are veterans who are very open-minded.
You've been with people who have tremendous artistic personalities and creative
capacity in cante and in music, such as Enrique Morente and Gerardo Núñez.
What do you think connects you?
It's a positive influence because as a dancer I not only learn by rehearsing
and seeing how much footwork I can do or how much technique I have, but by knowing
how to create, finding how to approach a dance. The fields, their climate, these
things they have open your mind when you do an alegrías, when you do anything.
Aside from that you have the strength and the energy they radiate. I'm lucky enough
to learn from them, not only when they say 'look how I play' or 'look how I sing',
but also in the way they say "come on, have a drink". They are very
great, they are very flamenco but, at the same time, so individual and so intelligent...
As people, they are philosophers...with no degree.
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