Much to the delight of Reykjavík’s dance enthusiasts, the August 2015 Reykjavík Dance Festival (RDF) kicks off today. This past November, February and May, RDF created a platform for great performances spread out over several weeks at a time, but this is the big kahuna: five days jammed packed with performances, workshops, and more.
Navigating the schedule of overlapping events can be a bit daunting, so here is a short list of things to look out for today.
‘THE OPENING’ by Margrét Bjarnadóttir
17:00 Gamla Bíó
Margrét Bjarnadóttir is the perfect mix of dancer meets stand-up comic. Her hilarious introspective solo at walk+talk last February was both honest and meaningful, as well as wildly entertaining. Today, she opens the festival with an RDF commissioned work where she explores thoughts like “If I was an instrument, I would be a cello that wants to be a drum kit.”
‘Gizelle’ by Halla Ólafsdóttir and John Moström
19:00 Borgarleikhúsið. Admission 2,900 ISK, tickets can be purchased here.
With ‘Gizelle’, John Moström and RDF alumna Halla Ólafsdóttir explore their love/hate relationships with classical ballet. The work looks at the intrinsic hierarchies of gender and principal vs. corps de ballet roles ingrained in classical techniques. This work goes further than Mark Morris’s men en pointe by integrating Cyberpunk, Rhianna and more.
‘Milkywhale’ by Melkorka Sigríður Magnúsdóttir
21:00 Tjarnarbíó. Admission 2,900 ISK, tickets can be purchased here.
With ‘Milkywhale’, choreographer Melkorka Sigríður Magnúsdóttir looks at the line between concert and performance. In collaboration with FM Belfast’s Árni Rúnar Hlöðversson, Melkorka presents a work that is part music and part choreography. ‘Milkywhale’ “features trivial things like love, trampoline exercises, whales and white animals.”
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