In THE DOG DAYS ARE OVER, the dancer is defined as a pure performer, striving after perfection. Subjected to a complex, mathematical, vigorous and exhausting choreography executed in forced uniformity, the eight dancers ultimately slip up. And then their masks fall.
The American photographer Philippe Halsman once said: “When you ask a person to jump, his attention is mostly directed toward the act of jumping and the mask falls so that the real person appears.” Jan Martens takes this stand as a starting point for THE DOG DAYS ARE OVER and exposes through the jump the person behind the dancer.
Thanks to its radical choreographic form, THE DOG DAYS ARE OVER reveals the audience’s perception of dancers, choreographers, spectators and the current cultural policy. Where does the thin line between art and entertainment lie? Who are we as an audience when we contemplate the suffering of dancers from the theatre like a bullfight in an arena? What do we want to get as audience? Do we want to experience an intensity that we do not feel in our everyday life? Do we want to experience beauty that is perhaps not visible in our everyday life? Is contemporary dance striptease for the elite? THE DOG DAYS ARE OVER makes the viewer shift in his position: from being merely subjected to the experience to actively reflecting on it.
THE DOG DAYS ARE OVER is the most critical performance by Martens up until today. It reveals the mechanism of looking in the theatre and our longing for entertainment, by demanding the stage to be a place for an encounter between one man and another.
- **** Charlotte De Somviele, De Standaard, 08 April 2014
A literally breathtaking dance that makes the specator an embarassed voyeur, witness of so much willingly suffering. Yet at the same time all that jumping makes up a clear statement about the raging chaos with which we rush through a more and more superficial life.
- **** Els Van Steenberghe, Knack Focus, 09 April 2014
Jan Martens conjures a mesmerizing choreography of nothing but jump strength and geometry.
- **** Annette Embrechts, De Volkskrant, 24 March 2014
PREMIERE: 20 March 2014, Frascati Amsterdam (NL)
BY: Jan Martens
WITH: Cherish Menzo, Nelle Hens, Piet Defrancq, Kimmy Ligtvoet, Steven Michel, Julien Josse, Laura Vanborm and Naomi Gibson
UNDERSTUDIES: Morgane Ribbens, Ilse Ghekiere, Amerigo Delli Bove, Daniel Barkan, Connor Schumacher, Caspar Knops and Victor Dumont
LIGHTING DESIGN: Jan Fedinger
DRAMATURGY: Renée Copraij
TECHNICAL SUPERVISION: Michel Spang
DURATION: 70 minutes
PRODUCTION: JAN and ICKamsterdam
INTERNATIONAL DIFFUSION: A Propic / Line Rousseau and Marion Gauvent
CO-PRODUCTION: DansBrabant, Frascati Producties, SPRING performing arts festival, tanzhaus nrw, CDC du Val-de-Marne La Briqueterie and TAKT Dommelhof
WITH THE SUPPORT OF: workspacebrussels and wpZimmer
WITH FINANCIAL SUPPORT OF: the Government of Flanders and Performing Arts Fund NL
THANKS TO: Dansateliers and Conny Janssen Danst