Morphing, Güldenhof
2021

Güldenhof performance

In June 2021 three members of DISTANT CAUSALS, Miquel Amengual Gual, Lísandra Týra Jóns and Emma Lusena Ash, participated as choreographers and performers for the happening organized by the Lebanese artist and composer Tarek Atoui in Güldenhof, a small village outside of Berlin, home and art space of the Danish artist Danh Vo.

The performance was based on the project from Tarek Atoui the Reverse Sessions, which is a project articulated in three sessions. Tarek Atoui had worked with a group of experimental musicians at the Berlin Biennale in 2014 on the first stage of the project called ‘Dahlem Sessions’, where the musicians where free to improvise with objects from its ethnomusicology collection. In the second session Tarek worked on the recordings of the performances to recreate a new mix tape. Lastly in the third session he brought the raw audio recordings to instrument makers for them to create new musical objects that would recreate the sounds of the ‘Dahlem Sessions’. These new musical objects were brought to Güldenhof for the performance where Tarek invited 15 musicians and three dancers (from DISTANT CASUALS) to improvise with and around these new musical objects scattered around land of Dahn Vo’s art space.

The duration of the performance lasted 7 hours and existed both indoors and outdoors where each of the musicians and dancers where free to improvise as long as they wished and where ever they wanted. The dancers mainly performed together, both with and without musicians, and focusing their improvisation on the practice and the ongoing research of morphing. They travelled through space with rhythmical reoccurring movements that brought a new understanding and translation of the sound produced by the musicians. Also, when there was no performed sound, the breath of the dancers created a rhythm that resonated in space, connecting to the sound performed before. Seeing the dancers slowly evolve through space while morphing also gave the audience the possibility to enter into their trance, which allowed a new experience of the sounds created by the musicians.

musicians invited:

Andrea Neuman Magda Mayass
Amelie Legrand
Raed Yassine
Mazen Kerbaj
Toni Elieh
Rabih Baini
Burkhard Beins
Andre Vida
Yan Werner
Axel Dorner
Michael Vorfeld
Toni Buck
Alan Affichard
Maurice Louca