Dansateliers presents: Courtney May Robertson and Sigrid Stigsdatter

the pleasure of stepping off a horse when it’s moving at full speed by Courtney May Robertson

A rider taming a wild horse is the metaphor Courtney May Robertson uses as a starting point for her short solo. She looks at the struggle between embracing one’s desires, and regulating behaviour in accordance with societal pressures. Visual projections encapsulate Robertson within an octagon spanning 3.5m in diameter. Through a combination of poetry, dance, and song, she travels across landscapes of personal desires, memories, and conflicts. The space acts like a time capsule; intimate home videos are spliced with samples from YouTube, documentaries and old films. the pleasure of stepping off a horse when it’s moving at full speed is Courtney May Robertson’s attempt to embrace the, sometimes messy, contradictions that make up a multifaceted human.

Cold Hawaii by Sigrid Stigsdatter Mathiassen

“So she retreats. She explores the vast emptiness, the territory of pleasure and the realm of silence after something breaking. Like a heartbreak that builds up, only to break down again, she creates a character that breathes, rises and disappears. Through movement and sound, words and songs she negotiates between harsh realities and the soft worlds of her imagination.”

Cold Hawaii is a solo that can be thought of as an esoteric novel where fiction becomes the map to reimagine reality. It is a paradox and a myth seeking to confront the desire to be exposed and be private, to be shy and be too much, to be someone, be no one, to be wild and be serene. It is a piece full of heartbreak, disappointment and rejection.