Third Dance Platform gets under way
After its success in previous years, the Third Platform of Contemporary Greek Dance is about to kick off at the Athens Concert Hall tonight. The Platform, a joint collaboration between the ACH and the Association of Greek Choreographers, takes place every two years. This year, 18 Greek dance companies will present their work in performances that will take place tonight to Sunday and January 25 to 27 next week. This time, the program aspires to create a bridge between Greek groups and their foreign counterparts, as the platform will be combined with the «Sound and Movement, Athens-Berlin» series of audiovisual events. The first part will feature performances by nine groups. Tonight, the Art dance theater will stage Artemis Ignatiou’s «Traces,» to be followed by the Kei Fyssa group’s «En meso anemon» (choreographed by Natassa Avra) and «Before Yesterday… Until Today,» choreographed by Alessandra Maioletti and performed by the Oneiro company. Tomorrow’s program will kick off with the Lydia Lithos company and «Chair’s Tragedy,» choreographed by Spyros Bertsatos. It will continue with the Mesomorph company’s «Hallucination» (choreographed by Christina Striftombola) and will end with the Natassa Zouka dance theater and «Duende,» choreographed by Zouka. The platform’s first part will end on Sunday, with performances by the Airessis company («Black Out» by Yiannis Bagourdis), the Myia group and Gavriela and Anna Anyfantaki’s «Angabi’s Game» and «Salto futuro,» a production choreographed by Tatiana Loverdou and performed by the Cabaret Toulouse-Lautrec. The second part will begin with the Kinitiras dance spectacle and Antigone Gyra’s «Invisible Clytemnestra» on January 25. On the same evening, the Enniamorfo contemporary dance company will present Teti Nikolopoulou’s «Knots» and the Eldor dance company Lila Zafeiropoulou’s «In l’instesso tempo.» On January 26, the Zita company will perform Iris Karayan’s «Self Portrait,» the Art dance theater will stage Artemis Ignatiou’s «Light Traces» and the Iros Angelos dance theater will present Petros Gallias’s «Emergency Drill.» The platform will end on January 27, with the Dalika dance theater and Vasso Giannakopoulou’s choreography «Nowhere,» the Allou, Edo, Pandou company and Patricia Lazou’s «Infinite Now,» Ioanna Parali’s «Mind the Gap» by the Landscape dance company and «Scale 5:1,» choreographed by Mariela Nestora, by the Yelp company. All performances start at 9 p.m. and take place at the Nikos Skalkottas Hall. The companies that will participate were selected by an international committee, consisting of choreographer and festival director Martin Bartelt from Switzerland, journalist and dance critic Ora Brafman from Israel, actor and artistic director of the Two Fish company Martin Clausen from Germany, writer and dance critic Donald Hutera from the UK, dance specialist from Belgium Samme Raeymaekers, festival artistic director Andre Theriault from Germany and journalist and dance critic Katja Werner, also from Germany. All of the second part’s performances will be preceded by concerts by the Ensemble Modern, as part of the «Sound and Movement, Athens-Berlin» program of events. Yet the Athens-Berlin highlight will be the screening of the restored copy of Walter Ruttman’s 1927 film «Berlin, Symphony of a Big City,» at 8.30 p.m. at the Friends of Music Hall this Sunday. It will be the restored copy’s first screening outside Germany. The film features music by Edmund Meisel, which will be performed by the ERT Greek Radio & TV National Symphony Orchestra, under the baton of Frank Strobel. Athens Concert Hall, 1 Kokkali & Vas. Sofias, tel 210.728.2333.
