Malta’s national dance company, ŻfinMalta, has unveiled its 2022/23 programme of productions.
The season begins in October with ‘On Reefs And Eroded Lands We Danced’, premiering in October at Valletta Campus Theatre. Taking inspiration from the Svalbard Seed Bank – a vault built to contain the world’s most prized crops in case of an apocalyptic event – the work by ŻfinMalta artistic director Paolo Mangiola explores what we see as essential elements to protect and preserve life on earth.
In December, six emerging choreographers close the year at Spazju Kreattiv with a series of solos and duets with the ŻfinMalta company dancers, based on the question ‘what will the future look like in 100 years?’
Two works performed in 2020 and 2021 to critical acclaim - ‘Girls & Boys’ by choreographer Roy Assaf, and ‘Weaving Chaos’ by Tania Carvalho – will be making a return to Malta, with both featuring in the annual ‘ŻfinDays’, which runs over two weekends in February at Valletta Campus Theatre and also boasts a double bill featuring a new work ‘OKOKOK’ by Marco D’Agostin and Paolo Mangiola’s ‘Nuova Figura’, which premiered in Gozo in 2021.
‘Utopia’, premiering in May 2023 at Teatru Manoel, is a new work created for ŻfinMalta by renowned choreographer Emanuel Gat. Gat proposes the idea that choreography, being a practice of organising groups of people in action, is a Utopian model showing clear evidence of being beneficial for the group involved and therefore of great value on a bigger scale in the ‘real world’.
ŻfinMalta will be working with creatives such as visual artist Matthew Attard, costume designers Louie Noir and Holly Knowles, set designer Tom Van Malderen, light designer Moritz Zavan Stoeckle, and Indian composer Goya to develop its productions.
There will also be open classes and training for young and professional dance makers, as well as community classes for participants with no previous experience. New to the programme is ‘Aspire’, an internship programme for aspiring dancers, and ‘Open Rehearsals’ taking audiences behind the scenes during the creation process.
‘Movimento’ and the ‘Artist in Residence’ programme will continue to demystify contemporary dance and provide a space for the exploration of ideas and new work.
“This season our gaze is on the future, in a time when conflict and climate change are very real and present in our lives,” Mangiola said as he unveiled the programme.