REQUIEM FOR Z.

Concept & choreography: Snježana Abramović Milković
Created with and performed by: Petra Chelfi, Martina Nevistić, Petra Valentić, Ognjen Vučinić, Nika Lilek, László Takács
Dramaturgy: Jasna Žmak
Music: Uroš Petković, Antonio Vivaldi (Nisi Dominus, Cum dederit, performed by Philippe Jaroussky, La Grande Écurie et la Chambre du Roy)
Interactive video: Ivan Lušičić Liik
Costumes: Kristina Jakovac Bangoura, Nada Došen
Light design: Aleksandar Čavlek
Photography: Maja Kljaić
Graphic design: Lana Hudina
Translation: Mirna Čubranić
Sound technicians: Tomica Kraljić, Kruno Miljan
Light technicians: Saša Bogojević, Marinko Maričić
Artistic director: Snježana Abramović Milković
Producer: Petra Glad
Coordinator: Gorana Orešković
PR: Kristina Krtanjek
Production: Zagrebački plesni ansambl / Zagreb Dance Company
Co-production: Zagrebačko kazalište mladih / Zagreb Youth Theatre

Supported by: Zagreb City Office for Culture, Education and Sport, the Ministry of Culture of the Republic of Croatia
Opening night: June 3rd, 2014 at 9 p.m., Zagreb Youth Theatre (ZKM)

Requiem for Z is motivated by Snježana Abramović Milković’s intimate need to try and figure out how to deal with ephemerality of human life, on and off-stage, and it can be considered a sort of sequel to Interface and Stripped, author’s previous works in which she dealt with the alienation in modern society among other things.Strong, agile and well-trained dancers’ bodies are placed into situations which suggest the times when those same bodies are not at their peak, but reveal their weaknesses and impotence, inherent to all bodies. Constantly creating the tension between individuality and fellowship, between the need for independence and the need for participation, their bodies are revealed both as very powerful and very vulnerable, self-sufficient but in search for other bodies. Two male and four female dancers are thus presented as human beings who grow more fragile with every new movement, but who also manage to find a renewed strength thanks to each other.
Inhabiting two worlds at the same time – the world of everyday life which is marked by metaphorical madness of daily routine, and the world in which that logic is halted and replaced with the effort to create profound relationships - dancers are searching for answers to the questions about their own and other people’s ephemerality, impotence, disappearances, departures… and revealing layers of intimacy which are hidden beneath frenzy, and not always easy to get to.

Aided in this play by a hand-held camera, dancers are simultaneously questioning the ways in which interpersonal relations are “mediatized” in today’s world, raising second thoughts about the prevailing complaints which claim that technology only alienates people. A camera and a screen (as the only elements of scenery) thus do not represent foreign bodies on stage, they are not just cold technology gadgets, but open up possibilities of interplay between real bodies and the images of those bodies, between the one who is recording, those who are being recorded, and those who are watching all that going on before their own two eyes. Inclusion of the camera in the choreographic process unequivocally speaks about the importance of recording in maintaining of even most intimate human relations, and about our ever growing obsession to record the time we spend together, which is sometimes motivated simply by our affection for the other.
Although requiem in the title suggests solemn strictness and sombre tones, Requiem for Z is an emotional and deep-felt show, not only a service for the dead, but also an invitation to contemplation to all of us who are still alive.

A renowned Croatian contemporary dance company, Zagreb Dance Company has since its foundation remained uncompromising in its particular artistic expression. Zagreb Dance Company has educated a number of dancers and dance experts who are now working in Croatia and abroad. Zagreb Dance Company has earned its reputation with the originality of its productions which are characterised by the performative energy and the unique readiness to face the challenges of different artistic approaches and poetics. Besides insisting on cooperation with the established artists from different fields of art, the important part of the work of the Company is opening up of the space for a new way of thinking about dance, the space for investigation which puts emphasis not only on the productions themselves, but also on the research process and education of the dancers.