Bulgarian Dance Platform: A Festival Diary

Follow along as we explore the 4th Bulgarian Dance Platform in Sofia: Up & coming artists, independent perspectives on dance and performance (and a little travel diary) waiting for you.

100% pack your suitcase /// 150% performance + dance /// 99% antistatic

The 4th Bulgarian Dance Platform is part of the Antistatic Festival in Sofia, happening from 16th-19th of May, and hosts independent dance artists, discussions, performances and artist gatherings.

#4 Short Review: 84 Dials (Stephanie Handjiska)

Capitalism has its very own ways to make things more expensive, all while promoting the narrative that customers benefit from a great deal (and would make a horrible mistake to not take up that offer). 84 Dials plays with this “fear of missing out”. Instead of presenting a coherent dance piece, the audience has to pay for short performances with previously handed out pieces of candy – everyone gets 10, wealth is equally distributed in this economy.

Still, not enough to see all shows. Audience members who cannot pay have to put on a mask over their eyes. Sometimes you get to see ballet, sometimes the two performers tell you a joke and move on. Watching is gambling, an investment. It’s the same thing that keeps you scrolling on Social Media, even though you already got bored of the short videos: The possibility of finding something unexpected.

I wasted my candy already in the first half and resort to illegal action: I watch without paying, trying to not make it obvious. The performers seem to have expected the inner conflict that results out of this – it all ends in a private striptease for the highest bid. Of course I don’t put on my mask after someone else paid for it, and of course I feel the shame of becoming an uninvited voyeur. 84 Dials presents an exciting idea, but could improve with a shorter duration and a more immersive concept.

#2 Day in Sofia

I joined a free walking tour around Sofia today and found out that Bulgaria’s history is as fascinating as it is sometimes very random. Three examples that the tour guide told us about:

The National Theatre was actually built by an Austrian architect. After it was finished, a director thought it would be a good idea to have gas lamps in front of the theatre curtain for a show, and burned the whole theatre to the ground. The only thing left is the two columns next to the entrance.
Some leftist group planned an attack on the monarch in 1925, even killed someone so that he would attend the funeral (that they could plan ahead for). They blew up a whole church, hundreds of people dead or injured. The monarch was one of the few survivors, simply because he was late to the ceremony.
A huge building that now carries the Bulgarian flag used to have a red star on top (Stalinist architecture). The rumour was that the star was made out of pure ruby, a fortune if ever sold. So when the Communist times ended, people gathered around to see a helicopter take down the red star, TV broadcasted the event - only to find out it was made out of plastic. It is now in a museum, alongside the statue of Lenin they took down to replace it with a statue of “Sofia” that the locals don’t like at all.

A wonderful trip comes to an end… It surprises me now that Bulgaria so often is overlooked. Until next time, Sofia!

#3 Short Review: METCH (Ivo Dimchev)

Visiting METCH is buying a ticket for many things at once: A concert, an art auction, a conversation, a painting session. Ivo Dimchev starts the performance by carrying an easel on his back, breathing heavily – he hates easels, and he hates painting. Meanwhile, the audience is supposed to read aloud the lines that are being projected on the walls, turning the script into a conversation: “You look like Jesus and a whore at the same time”, we tell him. What follows is an art auction of his collection of paintings. First the audience selects which ones they like and then they start bidding (their real money for a real painting to take home).

In between Dimchev performs his songs, dances with some of the paintings to impress “the press” and makes members of the audience come on stage and perform a theatre exercise with him. After some time, the previously empty wall is filled with paintings, stacked on top of each other as he starts painting a new one. While expecting another sassy painting that continues the frequent topic of “fucking”, he quickly turns the shapes into a woman holding a child and writes “Gaza” in capital letters over it. In the audience two mics are being passed on: One stream of positive affirmations, one stream of negative hate speech. Performing a character that is instantly liked, and that easily finds an intimate connection to its audience is a craft of its own. Ivo Dimchev knows how to master it.

#2 Short Review: Critical Mass (Silvia Cherneva)

Balance is crucial – especially when you must hold on to a table with no legs, mid-air, all while hanging from a rope. Three dancers represent the smallest amount, the so-called Critical Mass – of people, of substance – to hold this construct together and to make it move.

It all begins with an empty stage and three ropes hanging from the ceiling. The room is flooded with dimmed, warm light. The performers enter through a side door, already holding the big see-through board with plates, cutlery, cups, and fruit on it. Carefully they attach themselves to the ropes and climb up – setting up a dinner table over our heads, on top of their bent knees. They must stay cautious: One uncoordinated move might make the heavy board fall. So they slowly dance and swing their way up, while projecting flickering shadow figures on the walls. After a while, they seem comfortable enough to play with the situation, looking under the table and shaking it so much, that the water from the cups spills all over. When they return to the ground, while putting the board down, they are finally able to move more freely: Swinging around, hanging in the ropes, dancing together. In some parts it feels like watching ghosts dance. There is a sense of an underlying sadness in the fact that the three dancers are dependent on each other, but how beautiful their collective floating movements look. Critical Mass persuades with elements of dark romanticism and an unexpected gentleness throughout the performance. A must-see!

#1 Short Review: Hip Piece (Verena Billinger & Sebastian Schulz)

Six performers wait on stage, clothes and accessories on the floor. Hip Piece, as its name suggests, focuses on a body part that is often overlooked, or censored in everyday life. In history, as much as today, the hips and their movements were often seen as too daring, too much of a self-expression, too powerful and therefore to be oppressed. At the same time they are being exploited, by sexualising every movement that occurs below the waist. The performers start with alternating dance solos that explore the technical, sensual, and sometimes funny ways to make hips move – no music in the background that could make up any definite classification of what is happening on stage. They flow from one image to another without many interruptions.

First, the hips start moving and the rest of the body follows in logical consequence without many regards to dance styles or other rules. It is surprising how many movements can be immediately identified as quotations from different (pop) cultural backgrounds: An interconnected mix of (so-called) belly dancing, twerking, vogueing, classical dance moves, Latin and Afro dance techniques and Tik Tok-style dances make Hip Piece so intriguing to watch. This effect is explored further with different “costumes” – mostly masks, colourful outfits and accessories like shiny headpieces or body chains. Now the performers dance in interchanging group formations, often with similar choreography but different body types and expressions. A little disappointing is the added background music for this collective dance part; instead of an artificial sound that becomes tiring after a short time, the combination with a live drummer might have become a powerful symbiosis.

#1 Day in Sofia

When I arrived in Sofia, all I could see was rain and cars. My room is on one of the top floors of the hotel, which lets me watch over Sofia and its other streets – a beautiful sea of lights awaits me at night. The districts I have visited yet present themselves as a fascinating combination: Brutalist buildings and huge parks, I turn around to see tiny houses in different colours with overgrown gardens, an old woman selling magazines alone at a tiny stand, then a massive street and three McDonald’s signs in a row. I walk around a lot because I don’t understand the Metro. Cat encounters: 4. They’re very shy. Much in contrast to Sofia’s residents who have been super friendly, helping me or explaining where to go.