
Discussion panels devoted to the lifeworks of Yanka Rudzka, an outstanding choreographer who revolutionized Brazilian contemporary dance in the 1950s. Together with Brazilian guests, we will investigate the importance of traditional culture in contemporary art. We will also address the often problematic cultural borrowings and appropriations. The participants are: Lia Robatto, Prof. Maria Claudia Alves Guimarães, Maciej Rożalski, Anna Królica, Cristina Castro and Joanna Leśnierowska.
SATURDAY 17.06
12.00 prof. Maria Claudia Alves Guimarães: Between time and space: the trajectory of Yanka Rudzka
13.30 Lia Robatto: Stories of women dancing: Yanka Rudzka and Lia Robatto – cultures, differences and multiple inspirations.
15.00 Yanka Rudzka – Polish choreographer in Brasil? – Anna Królica and Joanna Lesnierowska in talk on inbetween wars dancing Poland and an issue of Yanka Rudzka’s „Polishnes”.
SUNDAY 18.0612.00 Joanna Leśnierowska: To repeat the gesture of Yanka – on practicing the meeting and challanges of The Yanka Rudzka Project: LEAVENING
13.30 dr Maciej Rożalski: Black performing arts in the context of Afro-Atlantic Culture.
15.00 Israeli Folk Dances Unplugged – a talk with Hadar Ahuvia (NYC) on critical practice of folk dances and her work on „Everything you have is yours?”
Lia de Carvalho Robatto
Outstanding director, choreographer, dancer and academic professor. Long-time soloist and assistant of Yanka Rudzka. In 1949 she began to study classical ballet at the City School of Ballet of São Paulo and the Academy of Ballet of Alina Biernacka. In 1952, she started dancing classes with Polish choreographer Yanka Rudzka, and in 1962 she gained dance degree at the Federal University of Salvador de Bahia. Within the framework of the Theater School, UFBA she founded an experimental dance group (GED) with which she produced most of her professional works. Between 1999 and 2004, she was a curator at the Cultural Market (Salvador) and in 2003-2006 she was the organizer and pedagogue of choreographers of Bahia workshops. In 2009 she was awarded honorary citizenship of Salvador. Since 1998 Lia is the director of the social project Axé Capoeira. In 2010 she was the chairman of the Bahia State Culture Council.
Anna Królica
A curator, art critic and dance historian. She graduated in theatre studies and in Russian philology from the Jagiellonian University. Since 2017 works as curator at Polish dance Theatre in Poznan. Also, she works on the programme of the Kalejdoskop Festival in Białystok, together with Karolina Garbacik and Joanna Chitruszko.. Her major projects include “Maszyna choreograficzna” (Choreographic Machine) at the Cricoteka Centre for the Documentation of the Art of Tadeusz Kantor; “Z perspektywy żaby” (A Frog’s Perspective, 2015); “Archiwum ciała” (Archive of the Body, 2013) at the Zamek Culture Centre in Poznań; “Goodbye Superman” (together with Paweł Łyskawa and Eryk Makohon, Nowa Huta Culture Centre, Cracow 2015) and “Portrety. Kobiety w polskiej choreografii” (Portraits. Women in the Polish Choreography, Staromiejskie Culture Centre, Cracow 2014).
Królica is the author of “Pokolenie solo” (The Solo Generation, Cracow, 2013), a book comprising a series of interviews conducted within an artist scholarship from the Ministry of Culture and National Heritage in 2012, and “Sztuka do odkrycia. Szkice o polskim tańcu” (An Art to Discover. Essays on Polish Dance, Tarnów, 2011), the first book about the most recent history of contemporary dance in Poland. She has written many articles for “Balet i taniec” (Ballet and Dance), a DVD collection published by Agora. She has collaborated with Dwutygodnik.com, Teatr, Didaskalia and Konteksty. In 2006–2010, she ran an opinion-making portal about contemporary dance, www.nowytaniec.pl.
Earlier, she was a member of the Artistic Commission of the Polish Dance Platform in 2008 and 2012, and the head of the Programme Council for Dance in the Institute of Music and Dance in 2011–2013. In 2011 she was the programme coordinator of the First Dance Congress in Warsaw. In 2008–2015 she taught her own original course on dance theatre at the Jagiellonian University, in the Institute of Contemporary Culture and the Department of Performatics. Currently she is writing a PhD thesis on memory and body in Tadeusz Kantor’s Theatre of Death and in Tanztheater Wuppertal Pina Bausch.Joanna Leśnierowska
Dance curator, dramaturge and performance maker; as a critic she has collaborated with theatre paper "Didaskalia", also published in "Teatr", "Autoportret" and outside Poland in „Theater der Zeit” (Berlin), „Dance Today” (Israel), „Dance Zone” (Prague) among others. In the years 2011-2014 she was a member of the advisory board the Institute of Music and Dance in Warsaw. Since 2004 she has been a curator of dance at the Art Stations Foundation, where she created and runs the Stary Browar New Dance program. As in turns a dramaturge, artistic consultant, light designer and performer she works with artists from Poland (Janusz Orlik, Renata Piotrowska, Marys Stokłosa) and abroad (Arkadi Zaides / Israel; Minimetal / Switzerland; Lia Haraki / Cyprus; Marta Ladjanski / Hungary; Yuri Konjar / Slovenia). Since 2011 she has been running and creating own choreographic projects (eg. "Reconstruction", ".. (rooms by the sea)".) In 2014 during the Polish Dance Platform she received the MKIDN Award for Best Choreography (INSIGHT) together with Janusz Orlik. Concept and curator of the Yanka Rudzka Project and co-creator (together with Janusz Orlik) of composition for LEAVENING.
Maciej Rożalski
Graduate of Warsaw University/Philosophy Department, currently a lecturer - professor at the Universidade Federal de Reconcavo - where he conducts research (and practice) in contemporary dance, theater and Afro-Brazilian rituals. He wrote a doctoral thesis at the Art Institute of Polish Academy of Sciences under the supervision of prof. Dr hab. Wieslaw Juszczak ("Contemporary and original mythical rite in alternative theater projects"). Collaborator of the "Context" magazine. For five years he collaborated with the Center of Theater Practices "Gardzienice". In his research work he focuses on the subject of multiculturalism, post-colonial aesthetics and contemporary, multicultural performance arts. In years 2012 - 2014 he stayed in Salvador for a doctoral fellowship awarded by the Polish Minister of Science (studies on the topic of Afro-Brazilian theater and dance). Participant of "The Yanka Rudzka Project" (leader of the research part).