Body Parts at Open House Festival

Body Parts

Fascinated by the face in a choreographic sense, Ramona Nagabczyńska in Body Parts delves into its plasticity and its cultural status.

Surrounded by a romantic aura, the face is considered to be the window of the human being’s psyche. Recent research into motor neurons gives us insight into the reasons why the face has achieved such cult status, but somehow scientific research never manages to overthrow the older discourses of the face.

While observing the face’s ability to be an ever-changing image which generates meaning, emotion and identity, Nagabczyńska also wonders; where did contemporary dance’s obsession with the neutral face come from and what is this neutral face? What is the connection between the grotesque and female subjectivity? What does the contemporary choreographies of the face tell us about cultural oppression?