FESTIVAL DE JEREZ 2007. ÁNGELES
GABALDÓN • INMACULADA ORTEGA
Baile-protest
Silvia Calado. Jerez, March 5th, 2007
‘Femenino plural’. Ángeles
Gabaldón Company. Baile: Ángeles
Gabaldón, Marco Vargas, Leonor Leal. Guitar:
Raúl Cantizano, Daniel Méndez. Cante: David
Palomar, Lucía Montoya. Percussion: Antonio Montiel.
Original idea: Ángeles Gabaldón. Script
and lyrics: Juan José Téllez. Choreography:
Ángeles Gabaldón, Javier Latorre, Marco
Vargas, Fernando Lima, Leonor Leal. Artistic and stage
director: Fernando Lima. 11th Festival de Jerez. Teatro
Villamarta (Jerez, Cádiz), March 5th, 2007
Ángeles Gabaldón
and Marco Vargas (Photo: Daniel Muñoz)
The challenge Ángeles
Gabaldón has set for herself is demanding.
The bailaora wants to keep on getting involved, using
her company’s projects for social purposes. Following
‘Inmigración’, she comes out with a
show aimed at vindicating women’s rights. They’re
good intentions, but putting them into practice is not
an easy task, inasmuch as the danced expression has to
go beyond esthetic discourse and at the same time offer
a message which is heard loud and clear. Of course, she
leans on other elements, including touches of dramatic
art, explanatory lyrics for the cante and video shows.
But... either it isn’t enough, or the guns aren’t
well-loaded.
The show is split up into nine acts.
It kicks off in a really original way, surprising the
audience in the hall of the theater with the cantaores
emulating por fandangos ‘Peleas en broma’
by Juan
Valderrama and Dolores Abril. Next, the originality
continues inside the theater when the bailaoras come out
from three points under spotlights amidst the crowd and
with the showing of footage from the film ‘Casablanca’.
The first baile scene is ‘Corazones de cuché’,
the representation of a window display in which superficiality
is criticized, the canon of beauty. Baile steps and showings
of mannequins. The rap por guajiras by Lucía Montoya
is interesting, working out the difficult musicality of
the lyrics.
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Ángeles Gabaldón
(Photo: Daniel Muñoz) |
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change of tone in ‘Natura’,
a piece which delves into baile for two shared between
Ángeles Gabaldón and Leonor Leal, representing
the feminist movement of “women who hug trees”.
They use plastic art and feeling, but they don’t
manage to get things across or sketch consistently. A
toná with macho heels is the transition to ‘Sinrazón’,
which as the bailaora explained, is a tribute to suffragettes.
And they do it three-way, with the man tying hands and
many touches of modern dance created by Fernando Lima,
the artistic director. A single flash of intensity; that
of the glass of water thrown in the woman’s face.
And a bit of delirium, especially on the musical side,
a jumble of noises which stuns the crowd.
The video show then returns, this time
projected upon a translucent curtain, allowing glimpses
of the bailaora’s movements to be seen while historical
images are looked over of mothers, female soldiers, politicians,
athletes... And you can hear Greek singer Haris Alexiou.
And a voice says: “Freedom is a train, and no matter
how late it gets in, it has a woman’s name”.
It leads to the bailaor seeking his feminine side, face
to face with the cantaora and a shawl, entitled ‘Otra
niña de fuego’, a zambra with music by Daniel
Méndez. But at this point, the audience still
doesn’t feel captivated. Now just the soleá
‘Soledad’ remains, a solo by Ángeles
Gabaldón in which she shows off her elegant baile,
just like in the close of ‘Inmigración’,
with a bata de cola. Refined arm movement, sweet curve,
beautiful picture... but scant allure, tension, warmth.
The applause from the crowd seemed to go out more to the
intentions than to the result. A time for reflection.
Solos en Compañía
Series. Inmaculada Ortega
Inmaculada Ortega
(Photo: Daniel Muñoz)
Having just come back from
a tour of Japan, Inmaculada
Ortega makes a stop in her hometown, Jerez,
to do a solo show, but accompanied by a peculiar
instrumentalist, guitarist and lute player
Amir Haddad. The bailaora let him do his own
music before she came out on stage with a
taranto she finished off por tangos and which
she used as the letter of presentation for
her show ‘De la raíz’,
elaborated over a slow fire with stylized
baile, exquisite arm movement, three-dimensional
and very communicative foreshortening (see
online video).
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| And tomorrow... Mercedes Ruiz •
Michio • Dospormedio
& Cía. 
Michio. Bodega Los Apóstoles (7 p.m.)
Mercedes
Ruiz, ‘Juncá’. Teatro
Villamarta (9 p.m.)
Further
information
Dospormedio & Cía. ‘Muñecas’.
Sala Compañía (midnight)
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