HARD TIMES GOOD TIMES
HARD TIMES GOOD TIMES - on discomfort, sublimation and movement
One year research project
Promoters: Annouk Van Moorsel & Annelies Van Assche
Image: Giorgos Athanasiou
The performative project ‘HARD TIMES GOOD TIMES - on discomfort, sublimation and movement’ is formed around a strenuous yet intriguing research question: how can I transform discomfort and uneasiness of daily life into artistic creation?
Based on improvisation, instant composition and a wide collection of personal (yet political) texts and archives, Sophia Danae Vorvila aspires to create a grid of experiences, to map ones narratives and confessions, harsh stories, vulnerability and tenderness, while articulating a kinetic vocabulary which speaks for itself. Sophia Danae Vorvila's intention is to create a portal for ones own agency to be heard and be seen via the (moving) body.
During this one-year research project, she is going to communicate and share her methods and choreographic tools of synthesis with fellow performers, musicians, visual artists and video makers; by doing so, she is going to invite them to make their own solos, based on her previous findings and research in a limited time frame of 16 hours of rehearsals. Hence, the participants will bring their own identity and exposure on stage, while carrying and performing their fragments of experience in front of the audience.
Sophia Danae Vorvila's research work is inseparable with personal narrative and body memory that, as a driving force, function daringly, reversing discomfort, turning it into creation. She tries to articulate a choreographic vocabulary that brings to the surface narratives beyond language, on the verge of enjoyment and annoyance, detecting the ambiguity and contrasts of our daily lives.
Sofia Danae Vorvila
researcher
Sofia Danae Vorvila is based between Athens and Brussels. She is a graduate of the Aktina Higher Professional Dance School (2015), the Department of Psychology at Panteion University of Social and Political Science (2016) and has completed (with distinction) the postgraduate research and choreography program of the Royal Conservatoire Antwerp in 2021.
As a performer, she has collaborated with several collectives and choreographers firmly rooted in theatre and contemporary dance, improvisation and performance, such as Romeo Castellucci, Hildegard De Vuyst, Jenny Argyriou, visual artist Jannis Varelas, the Little Things Orchestra, Simon Van Schuylenbergh (Ne Mosquito Pas), etc.
Currently, she is developing her own choreographic and collective work which oscillates between discomfort, uneasiness, pleasure, gathering fragments of memory, mictro-histories and documenting everyday life via movement and text.