This duet, with its animal sensuality, was initially presented with another duet “Transform-a-(c)tion”  and displays a dance cut from raw material which outsmarts and makes light of weight and gravity.

Musafa Kaplan's pieces develop an intense exploration of movement, energy and risk, within minimalist structures, using repetitive physical, though quite ordinary, actions somewhere between play, performance and choreography.

Cut off from their familiar context, falls, running, jumps and collisions attain an extreme expressiveness, to become pure performance. The body is the body executive, entirely concentrated on the task. Energy takes centre stage. Each composition draws its inspiration from a specific energy, an energy in transformation between movement, fragile immobility and break up, an energy which radiates from the bodies to invade the space and incarnate on stage.

Thus “Dolap” (literally cupboard) confronts two bodies with the heavy geometry, the imposing mass of a refrigerator. The object becomes body, origin and effect, as if endowed with an odd will, its own force and specific means of resistance. The balance is resolutely unstable, uncertain; the forces act upon and oppose each other.

Updating: March 2010

Mustafa Kaplan is an emblematic figure of the new Turkish dance scene. With his compatriot Filiz Sizanli (dancer with Mathilde Monnier and Emmanuelle Huynh, whom he met in the early years of his career), he explores the interactions between bodies, between balance and falling, machines and space, space and the body, the body and matter. Their pieces set makeshift devices to work with meticulous precision and often playfully, in which movement and energy provide the crucial gearwheels.

Mustafa Kaplan and Filiz Sizanli founded the Taldans company in 1996, with which they have developed numerous projects, including “Sek Sek” (2002), “Solum” (2005), “Graf” (2006) and “Dokuman” (2009). They went on to create ÇATI (Contemporary Dance Artists Association) in late 2004, an independent place of exchange, still unique in Istanbul, which aims to encourage the emergence of creative contemporary dance projects and collaborations between dancers, technicians, critics, researchers and audience.

Further information

https://taldans.com/

Updating: October 2010

Since 2001, the National Center for Dance (CND) has been making recordings of its shows and educational programming and has created resources from these filmed performances (interviews, danced conferences, meetings with artists, demonstrations, major lessons, symposia specialized, thematic arrangements, etc.).