Dance Ambassador Valeria

Totally at the mercy of dancing

"The Dancing Public" by Mette Ingvartsen

Valeria Golderer is one of five dance ambassadors who explore the dance landscape of Berlin on behalf of Offensive Tanz. At Tanz im August she saw for us the solo “The Dancing Public” by Danish choreographer Mette Ingvartsen in the Sophiensäle. According to the announcement, the piece “mixes ecstatic eruptions with pounding beats and is party, spoken word concert and expression of physical madness to the point of exhaustion in one”. Find out how it worked on Valeria here.

No chairs, small pedestals distributed in the room, loud techno music, the crowd of spectators and a dancer. Full of energy. Obsessed with dance. A single person who pulls everyone along. The urge to move spread to the crowd. Some people danced right away, most of them rocked the beat and got involved in the DANCE over time. But even if some people just stood still and watched, in every face I could see the tension and curiosity for every next move. Every step, every twitch in the arms, just every move was new or surprised you anyway.

She danced through the whole room, between all of us, her movements wild, unpredictable, actually obsessed and almost inhumane. Her body was driven.

The loud music and light made everything even more exciting. It was as if the rhythm of the music, the beat, was pulsating in her veins. And when she danced to individual people, they were immediately carried away. In between, when on one of the podiums, as presented, was completely spent, I thought it was almost at the mercy of the audience and totally devoted to us. But later I realized that she was not completely devoted to us, but to dancing.