"Bantu" de Victor Hugo Pontes no São Carlos

�8 — 20 JAN TEATRO NACIONAL DE SÃO CARLOS, LISBOA

BANTU VICTOR HUGO PONTES ©TUNA|TNSJ

DANÇA

“Bantu” refers to a family of languages spoken in

artistic direction Victor Hugo Pontes cast Dinis Abudo

sub-Saharan Africa: it is identity and it is community.

Quilavei, Dinis Duarte, João Costa*, José Jalane, Maria

“Bantu” means more than a linguistic occurrence. It can

Emília Ferreira, Marta Cardoso, Osvaldo Passirivo

also be: a language of its own that survived the imposed

internship training as a performer Francisco Freire stage

European languages; an identity mechanism; a sign

design F. Ribeiro music Throes + The Shine technical

forbidden to the colonizer; a form of communication, full

direction and light design Wilma Moutinho sound design and

of cultural, historical, religious and political codes; the

operation João Monteiro costume design Cristina Cunha,

ephemeral materialization of a long encounter. The word

Victor Hugo Pontes masks Cristina Cunha costume making

“Bantu” encompasses everything we want or imagine

Emília

Bantu, the piece, to be. What Bantu will be, however,

assistance Cátia Esteves artistic consultancy Madalena

depends on the eye of the beholder. This is also a place

Alfaia production management Joana Ventura executive

Pontes

e

Domingos

Freitas

Pereira

direction

that we wish to occupy: a different place for each of the

production Mariana Lourenço production assistance Inês

bodies that inhabit it, shared in the wounds it opens,

Guedes Pereira

staggering in the path it follows; an exuberant place in

* dancer kindly seconded by CNB to Nome Próprio

the celebration of the community gathered on stage.

From the language we speak, we see the world that is ours. It turns out that, from the different geographies to which we belong – whether in a country or a theater – we have different perspectives of the same world, so we can't speak the same language, see the same things or get to the same places. Bantu takes the opposite route and goes in search of a language stripped of words, a language transformed into sharing and identification: it is not a universal language; it is a possible language.

Bantu is a path yet to be traced, and the route is taken between two countries with complex affinities and profound memories of each other.

promoters OPART/ Estúdios Victor Córdon, Camões – Centro Cultural Português em Maputo institutional partner of Estúdios Victor Córdon Camões I.P. production Nome Próprio co-production A Oficina/CCVF, Camões – Centro Cultural Português em Maputo, Casa das Artes de Vila Nova de Famalicão, OPART/Estúdios Victor Córdon, Teatro José Lúcio da Silva, Teatro Nacional São João support for artistic residency A Oficina, Largo Residências, CRL Central Elétrica, Estúdios Victor Córdon, Teatro Municipal do Porto acknowledgements Joãozinho da Costa, Nuno Viegas OPART - Organismo de Produção Artística, E.P.E.

Bantu was born from an invitation addressed to Victor Hugo Pontes by Estúdios Victor Córdon and Camões – Portuguese Cultural Center in Maputo, to develop a new dance piece with Mozambican and Portuguese performers. Estúdios Victor Córdon and Camões – Maputo are partners in a programme that spans over three seasons and that aims to build bridges between the two countries and enable the circulation and internationalization of dance projects. Bantu results from this

The National Opera House of Portugal (TNSC) technical direction Joana Camacho (head of the technical department), João Paulo Araújo, Miguel Mendes stage machinists Joaquim Costa, Gonçalo Gonçalves lighting Pedro Galo, António Sofia sound and video Telmo Alexandre National Ballet of Portugal (CNB) stage managing Henrique Andrade (direction) technical direction | lighting Pedro Mendes, Paulo Godinho, Frederico Albuquerque sound Bruno Gonçalves, Paulo Fernandes, Luís Nunes stage machinists João Martins, Sérgio Torres

partnership.

costumes Cristina Fernandes

A program by OPART / Estúdios Victor Córdon, Camões – Portuguese Cultural Center in Maputo Nome Próprio has the support of the Portuguese Republic – Ministry of Culture / Directorate-General for the Arts and is a resident structure at Teatro Campo Alegre, within the scope of the Teatro em Campo Aberto program.

CENTRO CULTURAL PORTUGUÊS MAPUTO

BRIDGING NORTH AND SOUTH RUI LOPES GRAÇA Head of Estúdios Victor Córdon

Estúdios Victor Córdon and Camões – Portuguese Cultural Center in Maputo have established a partnership for a joint programming over three seasons, with the aim of creating bridges between Portugal and Mozambique that enable the continuous circulation and internationalization of artists.

It was within this framework that, between 2021 and 2023, we produced three editions of the Itineraries Program, dedicated to choreography and involving 12 Mozambican dance artists. During the course of the program, artist residencies, dialogues with local artists and presentations of the work in progress took place in Lisbon (EVC), Alcanena (Materiais Diversos), Deltebre (L'Obrador – Espai de Creació), Guimarães (A Oficina) and Maputo. Following this line of programming, for the 2nd edition of A Collection for Tomorrow, we focused on the Mozambican dance scene,

producing 10 conversations moderated and curated by Cristina Peres and directed by João Afonso Vaz. In 2021, we involved a young Mozambican composer in the Young Composers Program, and, also within the scope of the

partnership with Camões – Portuguese Cultural Center in Maputo, in 2022 we promoted a dance workshop/audition in Maputo.

Bantu is also a result of this partnership and was conceived

with the aim of intersecting cultures and enabling the performers’ mobility and internationalization. The piece, to be presented at Teatro Nacional de São Carlos, in Lisbon, at the start of the year that marks the 50th anniversary of the Revolution of April 25, indelibly expresses a celebratory spirit in which the Portuguese language is a common place of meeting and exchange, anticipating a desirable and necessary shared future.

Bantu had its world premiere at Teatro Nacional de São

João (Porto) in October 2023, after which it was presented in Vila Nova de Famalicão, Aveiro, Viseu and Maputo – as part of KINANI International Biennial of Contemporary Dance. After the presentations at TNSC, a new touring period will start, and the piece will be performed at Guidance Festival in Guimarães, and in the cities of Águeda, Leiria, Ovar, Coimbra, Funchal, Loulé and Torres Vedras.

It is our understanding that, rather than launching isolated one-off initiatives, it is important to walk permanently on common ground, weaving networks with artists in order to We would like to express our sincere gratitude to Victor Hugo Pontes (and to Nome Próprio) who committed to this project from the very beginning and successfully carried out such a challenge.

©BRUNO SIMÕES

bring North and South closer together.

©TUNA | TNSJ

A GOOD BREEZE

and soundtrack of Throes + The Shine. On a raft, boat or platform trolley, bodies are transported and

MARTA L ANÇA

retrieved. The images they create allude to both

Journalist and editor of the BUALA portal

conquests and victims.

They can be pushed and

Movement is the basis of everything. From temporary

expelled, or deliver water to the thirsty. The dance is

backrest to temporary backrest, it was necessary to

astonishing, seductive and very lively. There are

keep moving in order to build villages, cities, occupy

authority figures, kinglets, high heels with a basin on

territories and create heritage. We accumulate an

their heads, a bale that is also a dark cloud that opens

ecological footprint merely by existing, some much

up into a net. The images follow one another.

more than others (Mozambique, for example, is a victim

In Makonde culture, when someone puts a Mapiko

of environmental disasters without having played a

mask on their head and cloths on their body to dance,

part). Subsistence is the main driving force behind

they transform into a human figure or an animal, the

movement, as nomads of all eras can attest. They

mystery is part of it, no one knows which member of

moved and made things happen, they departed and

the community is behind the mask. Here too, in these

their lives probably improved. Others were uprooted by

recreated masks, the language of the choreographic

force and suffered greatly. They took their ancient

community doesn't need to be deciphered, no matter

rituals with them and acculturated to other places. In

how much we search for the origins and miscegenation

the

new

of the rhythms and movements. Transfiguration and

movements came about. And since the world doesn't

anthropomorphic figures help us find new atmospheres

belong exclusively to those who control it and their

and fulfill the desire to build something common, for

interests, movement continues to surprise. And when

the time being only in a defined time and space.

cultural

transfer,

new

languages

and

someone close to us moves, a good breeze blows. Of

I learned a lot when I was living in Maputo and as I

the 43 or so, Portuguese is the only language spoken in

traveled

Mozambique that does not derive from Bantu. It is the

medium-sized cities, mountains and islands), and I

(official)

remain intrigued by its history and violence. The

language

communicate,

and

through

which

we

try

to

(to

the

coast,

cultural, social, political and economic diversity, in which cubatas [african huts] and machambas [agricultural

times. But parallel realities, conflicting agendas and

fields], as well as strict rites of initiation, coexist with big

profound disagreements can sometimes give rise to an

cities, fashion shows and a maladjusted (westernized)

encounter. Just like these people in Bantu, where seven

development model. The conflicts in Cabo Delgado, the

dancers, three Mozambicans and four Portuguese, five

war over resources, the threat of land grabbing to

men and two women, four black people and three

small-scale producers, the influence of religion, a youth

white people, come into play together. They came with

that is constantly seeing its expectations crushed. But

their marks, their stories, their own rhythms on their

there is also the idea of community and gestures of

feet and in their minds. Together they practiced

solidarity, the warmth of rural people, the collective

rhythmic phrases, improvised a lot, exchanged roles,

catharsis, where music and dance are omnipresent. If no

deconstructed

knew,

one gets sick alone or dies alone, neither can one dance

encouraged each other's expression and that of a

alone. I am because we are, from ubuntu, from

collective that reshapes itself either as solos or as one

community ways of living and from the relationship

group. Touching each other, liberating themselves,

economy outside the colonial-global-capitalist system.

individually and socially, black and white bodies

Africa continues to invent modernity, and it demands to

contrast yet caress one another. The conflict of

get out of its position of subjugation in order to scream

previous generations, of geopolitics and coloniality is

its power to the world.

thought

brings

country

misunderstandings and the power relations of past

they

often

the

out

what

it

around

they

their history too, but what about “after that”? Is there

Let the creators circulate and contaminate each

an “after that”? Young people interested in each other's

other with their diverse knowledge, rhythms and

movement,

a

urgencies, in an unlikely encounter, revealing new

composition by Victor Hugo Pontes, who, in turn,

in

each

other's

stories,

perform

configurations to this tired and doomed world of ours.

worked from the materials and the movement with

This piece lets a good breeze of renewal vibrate.

which the dancers responded to his provocations.

Movement is the basis, and dance and music always go hand in hand in African cultures. Movement can be calm or fast, delirious, tongues lolling out, to the beat

*Text originally published in the program of the Teatro Nacional São João.

Estúdios Victor Córdon are a creative platform

within

OPART

aimed

at

supporting the independent artistic community.

Prioritizing

intercultural

dialogue

proximity,

and

artistic

transversality, it is a place dedicated to practice,

research,

creation

and

experimentation,

thought,

promoting

Board of Directors of OPART, E.P.E. Conceição Amaral Chair of the Board Rui Morais Member of the Board Susana Meneses Member of the Board

different perspectives and encouraging communication between peers.

Estúdios Victor Córdon Support

for

young

creators

and

performers, complementary training, daily dance practice for professionals and programs dedicated to thought, questioning and memory are some of the platform’s main focuses.

estudiosvictorcordon.pt

Rui Lopes Graça director Maria Luisa Carles project manager Tânia Alves communication and marketing coordinator, executive producer Mário Oliveira administrative and production assistant