Prostornina kože

"I thought I was talking about the
general, yet I found myself confronting myself. I wanted zeal, yet it was all
coming back to me, to the action which was facing me. To the surface of my skin
and to whatever limits it, to whatever it opens up, to whatever seeps through
it. "

Suzana Koncut is a translator, choreographer and
dancer, which seems an unusual professional combination, but not for her.
Translating means investing in the imaginary, an investment that enriches and
completes her. Just as she carefully chooses the literature she translates
(from Madame Bovary, over the translations of contemporary Maghreb literature,
to de Beauvoir's Le Deuxième Sexe), Koncut is also no hack choreographer. Prostornina
kože is her third piece since December 1994, when she premiered her first
trio. That is to say, Suzana takes her time. She makes precise,
well-considered, premeditated choices. Because all choreography – like every
translation – is demanding, it takes up all her energy, focus and
concentration. She is submerged in the material, and the material absorbs her.
She began dancing while studying French literature.
Realising she did not really fit into any of the aesthetics of the existing
dance companies, she decided to create her own projects, which she always made
in close dialogue with artists working in other disciplines. In her first (Potohodniki,
'94) and second piece (Kvintet, '97) she confronted herself and her
co-dancers with the physical presence of the musicians and their instruments.
For Prostornina Kože she entered into an alliance with video-artist
Davide Grassi. As if -- after her studies of the images behind the sound -- she
now tries to find sounds and words on the surface of the image, the skin, "The space which I inhabit. But which has no centre".
"Is it
really the surface or is it already the inside? How thick is it? On which side
are traces visible? Is it the limit or the thickest belt of fluidity? Must it
really be visible in order for the meanings that form on it to be perceptible?
Does it exist at all if it isn't visible? Does it communicate in any other
manner? Are my roles carved in it, or are they outside of it, in the look, or
already under it? Is it the one that makes me distinguishable? How on earth can
it represent itself as a figure of everything that has already built up, how
can it still be as one? When under it, a feeling of decentralisation,
infinitude, non-entirety, which is euphoric. And which relates me to the
numerous, the different, no matter how different. Its potentials are around it,
outside and inside it. On the background where it positions itself.  In that which it allows to pass through,
which it doesn't filter. The point up to which it can stretch itself.  It can't really protect me from anything.
There is no purity.”

Conceived
and choreographed by: Suzana Koncut; visuals and video:
Davide Grassi; assistant to the choreographer:
Gregor Kamnikar; dramaturgy: Bojana Kunst; sound design: Brane Zorman; costumes:
Marcela Okretič, production: ŠOU v Ljubljani; supported by Ministrstvo za kulturo RS.
the author wishes to
thank: Forum Ljubljana, VPK, Mini Teater in SLKD Izola.