Performance by Marta Navaridas (2024)

In her new work ONCE UPON A TIME IN THE FLAMES – Our Firebird Ballet, Marta Navaridas stages a multifaceted modern fairy tale, in which the characters are six performers from five different countries. Through individual autobiographical stories from their childhood and coming of age, they reveal some of the power dynamics of repressive, patriarchal, and nationalistic-folkloristic agendas they were exposed to in their respective ballet and folk dance training.

To the sounds of Igor Stravinsky’s Firebird ballet from 1910, they engage in a cathartic choreography that liberates and empowers them both individually and collectively.

Against this backdrop, Navaridas turns to Igor Stravinsky’s Firebird, which is considered an example of musical rebellion, but is also mixed up with Russian nationalism and packaged as an implicitly anti-Western, anti-classical fantasy. In a way, it could be considered punk before its time, but is heavily implicated in a by-now toxic nationalist tradition. Navaridas and her ensemble question this repertoire and liberate themselves from embodied classical doctrines, resulting in a dance of raw, untamed, and repressed feelings, a display of folk horror and a passionate and joyful critique of patriarchal violence and oppression.

Concept and Direction Marta Navaridas Text and Performance Veza Fernández, Stina Fors, Lau Lukkarila, Marta Navaridas, Maja Osojnik, Denise Palmieri Music Igor Stravinsky Live Electronics and Sound Design Manuel Riegler Dramaturgical Advice Alex Deutinger and steirischer herbst team Outside Eyes Nerea González, Sara G. Novi, Jenny Weiss Costumes Annemarie Arzberger Stage Design Georg Klüver-Pfandtner Light Design Christina Bergner Production Management Sophie Schmeiser/mollusca productions Production PERFORMANCEINITIATIVE 22 and steirischer herbst Supported by Kultur Stadt Graz, Land Steiermark, Bmkös Thanks Alix Eynaudi

Comissioned by steirischer herbst ´24