Recently the story Once You Are Not A Stranger, of the dance performance of Janis Brenner & Dancers has appeared here. This dance premiere took place at the beginning of June at the Gibney Dance Center on Broadway. Among its collaborators was also the Slovene multimedia artist Eva Petrič. Janis Brenner invited her to make the set design and the video which appeared as a part of the set design.
Only weeks after this Eva Petrič was again invited to present herself in New York in the role of a set designer.
This time she participated with her set design at the opening of this year’s Battery Dance Festival on August 13 (the festival will last till August 19) – on the invitation of the former long time principal dancer of the Martha Graham Dance Company in New York Tadej Brdnik, who shares with Eva Petrič the same native country, Slovenia and who, after retiring as a dancer, works now in New York as a principal choreographer.
For her set design Eva Petrič used her »Hematoma«, the assemblage of recycled laces that she collects from all over the world.
Tadej Brdnik
For this year’s Battery Dance Festival, the longest running free dance festival in New York, Tadej Brdnik, who left Slovenia 25 years ago, created the performance Tatting. Inspired by Eva Petrič’s lace hematoma he choreographed his piece to the Violin Concerto of the famous American composer Philip Glass.
For the choreography Tatting (a type of narrow lace) Eva Petrič created a sail from recycled laces that she found at various parts around the world. She placed it against the background of the famous Statue of Liberty which located at the tip of New York’s Manhattan, for decades salutes numerous newcomers coming to this part of the world. With this set against the background of the Statue of Liberty, Eva wanted to accentuate the message of this year’s festival, the need to stress the importance of openness and interconnectedness of people in nowadays world. Her sail, composed of numerous nets, connected into one big piece enabling to catch the wind and drive people to realize their dreams, reminds of the fact that without the openness to new ideas, new people and different cultures New York would not become what it is today – the place that is still offering opportunities to people from many parts of the world.
This year’s battery Dance Festival being already the 36th annual festival will last till August 19, with different dance performances taking place every evening at New York’s Battery Park.
The festival was actually opened with two performances; first, with the world premiere of the Balad – the Song of Rain, of the dancer and choreographer Husseim Simko and journalist Ryjadh Mohammed, who emigrated from Irak and wish for their performance to prevent islamophobia.
View of the performance Tatting which closed the opening evening.
Among the performing groups and dance companies, besides Battery Dance from America, there are also Bollycious from Belgium with the performance Yatra, Mophato Dance Theatre from Botswana with performance Pula, Co. Nacional de Danza Contemporánea de República Dominicana from the Dominican Republic, Cia Elias Aguirre from Spain, Peridance Contemporary Dance Company, SYnC Dance Company, Trezon Dancy… And especially for the 70 year’s anniversary of India’s independence there will be points from the 9th Festival Erasing Borders Festival of Indian Dance.
The performance was in a way also closing and the same time opening of a new phase in the life of Tadej Brdnik, within the last two decades one of the leading dancers from Slovenia abroad.
Tadej, today 45 years old dancer originally from Slovenske Konjice, arrived in New York 25 years ago, after winning the Benetton Dance competition and as an award getting the place at the Martha Graham Dance School and later Dance Company. Since then Tadej remained in New York, devoting his time to dance.
Tadej Brdnik
His plans after retiring as a dancer are to remain in New York and to continue working in dance choreography and teaching and introducing young people to modern dance.
Marijan Zlobec