The practice of flamenco dance has seen an explosion in Malta over the past 20 years, with more and more women and girls taking to the art form, apart from an increase in men too. This local popularity is in sync with its global growth, as people as far as Japan and India are engaging with this passionate and grounded form.

Sharon Sapienza was an inspiring woman who cultivated this growth further, locally and internationally. She made dreams her reality and inspired others to dream further by doing so – and more importantly to work towards those dreams.

The performance conveys the beauty and versatility of this dance form

She reached the height of what is possible for a flamenco dancer, acknowledged as a flamenco artist from within the most intimate of the art’s communities, such as Los Farrucos, from a very early age.

Sharon carved out numerous collaboration opportunities with acclaimed Spanish artists, and moved on to produce their work and travel internationally as an ambassador for Flamenco. She managed this because she had passion, skill, vision and a motivation to work as hard as was necessary to realise her ideas.

The incredible wealth of work she produced at such a young age makes her untimely death one year ago all the more significant. We are able to be thankful for her having invested so much energy and creativity into her work from such a young age... and at the same time mourn the loss of her presence and the body of work that was not given the chance to take life.

Thanks to the Teatru Manoel BOV Performing Arts Festival, a Maltese audience was able to witness Sharon’s last creation. Significantly, this was the realisation of a dream that took a different path to flamenco.

Mu-Danzas Boleras gives new life to another form of Spanish dance – escuela bolero. This is a form that has a much quieter presence in cultural life than flamenco. It was Sharon’s dream to give it its due presence on stage, a dream she made happen to tie in with the 200th anniversary since the drawing up of the Spanish constitution.

The performance gives an artistic frame to historical events by tracing the history of the escuela bolero as it emerged and took shape with and through unfolding social events.

It is given a dramatic frame as we see this history unfold through the narrative of a company of dancers, a story that begins at the moment of the revolution against the French occupation.

The concept of the play within the play is one much used in theatre, but this was the first time I have seen it used within dance. Our attention was drawn to it through very simple but clever dramatic techniques.

Escuela bolero and flamenco make for very different forms of dance, and yet both permeate Spanish culture and tradition. Both are identifiable as Spanish forms. They have developed independently in very different sectors of Spanish society, and yet they are marked by a shape of the arms and grace that is unique to Spanish tradition.

Escuela bolero, which emerged from the court dances and is therefore closer to other European forms of dance, still bears marks of its transformation within the Iberian Peninsula. The sound of the castanets is particular to this form of dance, and requires enormous skill from the dancers to play their rhythm as they perform their dance.

The performance brought together a company of six dancers of impressive grace, precision and agility under the choreography of Francisco Velasco.

The performance conveyed the beauty and versatility of this dance form as it transformed itself subtly through 200 years, each period bringing out new nuances. Its aesthetic was the holistic work of a rich creative team where each element served to add layers of texture and beauty to the piece as a whole.

Each element worked for the whole, so that the performance was a tapestry of light, sound and visual display. Yet, each element could be inspected separately for its perfection.

The lighting design in particular, by Olga Garcia, was intricate and effective, allowing for each frame of movement to take the shape of a painting second by second.

This was a performance for those who enjoy aesthetic pleasure to the ear and to the eye. Sharon has definitely allowed for the intricate beauty of this art form to take its place on the stage.