One does not need to point out that 21st-century social relations have overstepped the boundaries of "normality". The question is whether we can render them meaningful through learning know how to live together and working towards a common goal, and above all, whether our heart is truly in it. 

Is our social core healthy enough to establish new social foundations? And when in the face of overpowering environmental challenges our "self-preservation" instincts tell us to escape or retreat in the name of safety, this also results in feelings of loneliness, isolation and helplessness. All these changes call for restrictions and adjustments, which implies a call for a new order, new ways of self-organised coexistence, autonomous zones and communes. 

The show Doors Wide Closed provides a series of possible suggestions and ways of creating a sense of freedom when dealing with various physical limitations of spaces. In his play Behind Closed Doors French playwright Jean Paul Sartre establishes the fundamental premise that we are condemned to a life in co-existence for eternity. In its very essence, the show presents an example of a post-apocalyptic interior and off-stage exterior, populated and cohabited by an entity of like-minded people removed from the outside world. Here, they seemingly and literally push back boundaries and confront restrictions through various art forms. With their directness, they create a genre conglomerate that enables parallel readings of the personal and social and a unique interpretation of the role of the body in a "new" social reality.

Da so družbena razmerja v 21. stoletju prešla meje »normalnosti«, ni treba prav posebej poudarjati. Vprašanje ob tem je, ali jih lahko kljub temu osmislimo tako, da znamo živeti skupaj in delovati za skupni cilj, ter predvsem ali to sploh iskreno želimo. Ali premoremo dovolj zdravo družbeno jedro, ki bi znalo vzpostaviti nove družbene temelje? In ko v boju z okoljskimi ekstremi »samozaščitniško« ravnanje narekuje beg ali umik v imenu varnosti, to obenem sproža občutke osamljenosti, izoliranosti in nemoči.

Vse te spremembe narekujejo omejitve in prilagoditve, kar kaže na klic po novi ureditvi, samoorganiziranju v načine sobivanja, avtonomne cone in komune. Predstava Na stežaj zaprta vrata vzpostavlja niz mogočih predlogov in načinov, kako ob različnih fizičnih omejitvah prostorov vseeno dosegati občutja svobode.

Francoski pisatelj Jean Paul Sartre v svojem delu Za zaprtimi vrati vzpostavlja temeljno vodilo, da smo peklensko obsojeni med seboj. Predstava že sama po sebi ponuja primer postapokaliptičnega interierja in eksterierja zunaj odra, ki ga naseli ter v njem sobiva entiteta somišljenikov, odmaknjenih od zunanjega sveta. Ob tem navidezno in dejansko preizkušajo prestopanje meja ter se soočajo z omejitvami skozi različne umetniške oblike. S svojo neposrednostjo ustvarjajo žanrski konglomerat, ki omogoča vzporedno branje osebnega in družbenega ter samosvojo interpretacijo vloge telesa v »novi« družbeni realnosti. 

The Quartet is a show for two dancers – a woman and a man – and two cameras. The couple explores the neuralgic points of their relationship history, the continuous cycle of love and abuse. In this microcosm, lust and violence interlace with love and pain. The cameras that follow the action dispels naturalistic illusion allowing the audience to create their own theatrical fiction. Shown from different perspectives, the fabricated story reveals itself to the viewers enabling them to observe the construction of performative reality.

In cooperation with GRIP, Cankarjev dom is hosting a free workshop for professional dancers, choreographers and performers to be held on the day of the performance, 6 May, between 10.00 and 13.00 in Duša Počkaj Hall. The workshop will be conducted by Jan Martens, the founder of the touring dance company. 

The workshop is full. No more places available.
 

In this workshop, the participants will revisit together with the workshop leader a part of the creative process of Martens' latest production, any attempt will end in crushed bodies and shattered bones, working with the complex score of Gorecki's Concerto for Harpsichord and Strings Op.40, which acts as a unifying pillar for the 17 movement solos in any attempt. Each participant will be invited to create their own short solo movement phrases by translating the music (its rhythm, energy, and general feeling) into their own body. The workshop will focus on precision, coordination, rhythm, musicality, and the feeling of moving together with a group in the most individual way possible.

The work of Jan Martens (1984, Belgium) is nurtured by the belief that each body can communicate, that each body has something to say. That direct communication expresses itself in transparent forms. His work is a sanctuary in which the notion of time becomes tangible again and in which there is room for observation and emotion as well as reflection. To achieve this result he creates not so much a movement language of his own, but shapes and reuses existing idioms in a different context to enable emergence of new ideas. In each new work he tries to redraw the relation between the public and a performer.
Martens studied at the Fontys Dance Academy in Tilburg and graduated in 2006 from the Dance Department of the Artesis Royal Conservatoire of Antwerp. Since 2010 he has been making his own choreographic work which, over the years, has been performed with increasing regularity before the domestic and international audiences. 

Since 2011, Jan Martens has been making work that talks about how people relate to each other and to the here and now. This resulted in a wide array of pieces: a duet (Sweat Baby Sweat - 2011), solos (Ode To The Attempt & lostmovements – 2014 & 2018), meetings between people who never saw each other before (The Common People - 2016), group pieces that are buzzing with surrender and ecstasy (The Dog Days Are Over with 8 dancers & Rule Of Three - 2014 & 2017), a work for young people that tackles issues such as gender diversity and gender equality (Passing The Bechdel Test – 2018).

In cooperation with Ultima Vez & KVS, Cankarjev dom is hosting a free workshop for professional dancers, choreographers and performers to be held on the day of the performance, 14 April, between 10.00 and 13.00 in Duša Počkaj Hall. The workshop will be conducted by Wim Vandekeybus, the founder of the touring dance company, and dancer Maria Kolegova. Vandekeybus' reflection provides the starting point for the workshop: 
“Dancing for me is being guided by a strong inner intuition rather than by technique. Movements are to communicate, with yourself as an honest expression and with others to communicate. Movement is like talking, singing, laughing… As long as it tells something that has to be told as an urge, like an impulse, unstoppable. Therefore, dancing is close to theater. A carrier of inner states which are shared to tell stories.”

The workshop is full. No more places available.

Wim Vandekeybus (1963) 
A choreographer, dancer, filmmaker, and photographer. He founded his dance company, Ultima Vez, in the mid-eighties. Vandekeybus has created a language of movement wherein he juxtaposes intuition, impulse and instinct with energy, risk and danger, which exemplifies a dramatic Weltanschauung, full of dynamics and conflict, through the medium of dance. A central focus in his work is the irreconcilable conflict between body and mind, feeling and intellect, man and woman, nature and culture, man and animal, group and individual, illusion and reality. 
Among his most recent pieces, Mockumentary of a Contemporary Saviour (2017) and TrapTown (2018) reveal his disquiet about the current political state of the world. While Traces (2019) focuses on the troubling relation between humanity and nature, his creation Hands do not touch your precious Me (2021) dives back into the ancient Mesopotamian myths. In 2022, for the 35th birthday of Ultima Vez, he made Scattered Memories, with past dancers of the company together with current ones, and with scenes reinterpreted and taken inside out.
In 2020 he has been working with the International Theatre of Amsterdam choreographing Ivo van Hove’s Age of Rage and he has created a new piece with the London-based Rambert Company, Draw From Within, that was awarded the UK National Dance Award for Best Digital Choreography.
Wim Vandekeybus has directed several dance movies, including Blush (2005) and Here After (2007), as well as feature films Monkey Sandwich (2011) and Galloping Mind (2015).

Maria Kolegova
Maria Kolegova began her dancing career at the age of five at a ballet school in Russia. Later, during her studies at the School of Contemporary Dance in Yekaterinburg, she discovered other disciplines, such as jazz, folk dance, martial arts, and yoga. Her first collaboration with Wim Vandekeybus was in 2012 for the revival of What the Body Does Not Remember; it was the first of many of his productions that she would dance in.

Trio Novak, Simon in Homan – prvi kot sodobni plesalec in druga dva kot glasbenika – se je leta 2021 prvič srečal na odru Festivala Spider. To srečanje ni bilo niti slučajno niti povsem predvidljivo, kajti vsakršen stik plesalske in glasbene ustvarjalnosti vzpostavlja polje paradoksov, izmenjav in presečišč, zlasti pa eksperimenta. Koncert improvizirane glasbe in plesnega performansa Vstajenje 2.0 si za izhodišče in gonilno silo jemlje prav paradoks srečanja med avtorji, ki predstavo ustvarjajo. Dobo digitalne hiperpovezljivosti namreč poganjajo algoritmi in ukazi, ki sooblikujejo družbene koreografije tako v virtualni sferi kot v materialni realnosti. Fizična prisotnost telesa se tako gradi iz fizične izkušnje stika, časa, ritmov, izmenjave. Srečanje je zato nujno »vmesni« dogodek – vidnega in nevidnega, slišnega in (ne)slišanega. V ravnovesju med tišino in negibnostjo ter zvokom in gibom nastopi vstajenje.

Beno Novak (1991)se je izobraževal na Akademiji za ples v Salzburgu (SEAD), The Tisch Dance NYU in The Place London. Sodeloval je s številnimi priznanimi koreografi in skupinami, kot so Gary Clarke Company, Jason Mabana Dance, James Wilton Dance Company idr. Delo Bena Novaka vključuje raziskovanje osebnih izkušenj, izraženih skozi močno fizičnost, z občutljivostjo, krhkostjo, močjo in izčrpanostjo. Nujna sestavina pri nastajanju njegovih del je sodelovanje z drugimi avtorji. Beno Novak je umetniški in izvršni direktor festivala Summer Intensive na Portugalskem ter festivala Kalejdoskop v Sloveniji.

Elvis Homan (1991) je bobnar, oblikovalec zvoka, skladatelj, pedagog. Končal je Codarts Rotterdam, Univerzo v Ljubljani in Akademijo v Amsterdamu. Je prejemnik nagrad Erasmus Jazz Prijs 2016 in 2017, De Doelen Rotterdam in Leiden Jazz Award 2017. Nastopal je na številnih festivalih v Sloveniji in tujini, je član Rotterdam Electronic Orchestra, Quartzite 4tet, Punky Button Clan, Void Noise, aug.unis in je sodeloval še pri mnogih drugih mednarodnih projektih. Z Boštjanom Simonom je komponiral glasbo za film Haxan.

Boštjan Simon (1982)je inštrumentalist, pedagog, producent. Zaključil je Univerzo v Ljubljani in Amsterdamski konservatorij in je ustanovni član mednarodne zasedbe Zlatka Kaučiča »Orkester brez meja« ter umetniški sovodja Mednarodnega srečanja saksofonistov SAXGO v Novi Gorici.

Zhuangzi and the riddle of European Subjectivity is a dark-green comedy performed by the members of the Department of Asian studies at the University of Ljubljana, and some international guests. It is a humorous, sarcastic musical which contains a lot of jazz singing and dancing, but also some deep contemplations and thoughtful dialogues between Eastern and Western philosophy. The performance has been directed by the Japanese - Korean dancer and choreographer Ryuzo Fukuhara.

Based on real-life events, My War Accordion tells the story of Matija Zorc, Aleš Šteger's grandfather, and spans the five most tumultuous decades of the 20th century, extending from Trieste – via Ljubljana – to the North Sea and the Slovenske gorice region. Through the mediums of storytelling and music, the cabaret de-ideologizes established historical views and divisions, raising the question of historical guilt and accountability without passing conventional judgment.
The cabaret blends elements of poetry, storytelling, performance art and music with video and sound effects. The text is written as a rhymed narrative; the central motif is the grandfather's black accordion, his lifeline in turbulent times, all that remains after bygone ideologies and turmoil, historical dilemmas and crusades. 

Based on real-life events, My War Accordion tells the story of Matija Zorc, Aleš Šteger's grandfather, and spans the five most tumultuous decades of the 20th century, extending from Trieste – via Ljubljana – to the North Sea and the Slovenske gorice region. Through the mediums of storytelling and music, the cabaret de-ideologizes established historical views and divisions, raising the question of historical guilt and accountability without passing conventional judgment.
The cabaret blends elements of poetry, storytelling, performance art and music with video and sound effects. The text is written as a rhymed narrative; the central motif is the grandfather's black accordion, his lifeline in turbulent times, all that remains after bygone ideologies and turmoil, historical dilemmas and crusades. 

Olivier de Sagazan, a biologist by training, began painting and sculpting with the pervasive idea of questioning organic life. His passion for breathing life into matter gave him the idea of covering his body with clay in order to observe the emerging "object". This experiment resulted in Transfiguration, a solo in which we see the transformation of a man. On stage, the created mutant, half man half monster, starts looking for its own true identity under the masks. The performance takes us on a fascinating journey into the uncanny soul of the artist. It produces a visually rich experience that gives new meaning to life and offers a mesmerizing, occasionally disturbing and exciting insight into an alternative self-image that is completely uninhibited.

Urška Rupnik and Maša Kagao Knez are the authors of the project Historicization (of Contemporary Slovenian Dance) whose basic guideline is the re-actualization of the creators of contemporary dance in Slovenia. Its history is extremely rich, colourful and varied, but regretfully also forgotten, despite the abundance of footage, photographic material, newspaper coverage and other documentation of the activities of the leading names on the contemporary dance scene since the 1970s.