Following a workshop on developing the physical skills and stimulating individual and collective activity, in a city full of violence, “Beirut Physical Lab” presents the physical theater performance, with the participation of a number of performers, who have worked for three months to find “subjects” or “ideas” related to their beloved city Beirut, to present them with movements or revelations, in order to obtain a new model of physical language.
This artistic and creative work aims to restore the feelings towards the city, and to question how much we still belong to it. It also provides a safe space to unite the people living in Beirut and its surroundings, to express themselves via their bodies, and connect through movement.
“BeiRoot Bodies” is an annual program, not signed by only one person, but by the whole group taking part of it.
Bassam Abou Diab is a performer and dance artist focused on contemporary dance and folklore. He graduated with a BA in theater from the Lebanese University in 2010. He got his master degree in “Actor Training” in 2019.
Bassam Abou Diab has been dancing with “Maqamat Dance Company” for several years and performed four creations “Mushrooms and Fig Leaves”, “Hibr”, “That Part of Heaven” and “Watadour”. He has been participating in “Takween” dance intensive program every year, where he had the chance to work with international choreographers. Such as” Marcel Leemann, Thierry Smith, Luc Dunberry, Marco Cantalupo, Kristina De Chatelle, Damien Jalet, and others.
In 2012 he received a scholarship from Dancing on the Edge to participate in “HJS” summer intensive. Bassam has also performed in many theater plays in Lebanon with different directors like: Nidal al Ashkar, Jawad al Asadi, Ossama Halal, Rouaida al Ghali, Badih Abou Chakra and Malek Andary.
Bassam Abou Diab’s Work:
He created, choreographed and danced several performances “not connected”, and “under the flesh” and “Of What I remember” (both currently in touring) “Eternal” and “Pina My Love”. He has recently co-created a performances titled “Who Cares ” with Olimpia Fortuni, Leonardo Maietto and Yeinner Chicas presented in Matera,Zaragoza. “Incontro” with Jacopo jenna, it was presented in Marseille, Beirut and Paris.
Bassam Abou Diab’s Workshop:
In addition, he directed and choreographed “The Siege/L’Assedio” with Monica Ciarcelluti presented in Pescara and “phalastinian karma”, a performance for the national Academy of Rome that was presented during Ravello festival in Italy. Bassam Abou Diab crected and choreographed for Green/Dance entropy company part of “home” a performance based on “Rituals and movements” presented in New York.
Bassam started acting and dancing in plays since early age, collaborating with many presitigious Lebanese and Internatonal directors. Most plays have been followed with trips to different countries, such as Tunisia, Germany, Belgium, France, Netherlands, Norway, Spain, United States, Italy and many others.
Using his experience in academia, Bassam shared his knowledge in dancing and acting since 2008 with his students, by teaching at the high school and university level, the moder, contemporary and folklore dance.
A consecutive series of 5 separate sessions concerning contemporary_dance and physical expression featuring 50 professional and amateur artists and performers who were forwarded by the Swiss choreographer Simea Cavelati and organized by the Beirut Physical Lab & choreographer Bassam Abou Diab . Participants acquired an arsenal of physical expressions throughout the course whilst delving deep into their inner momentum and to create an unprecedented challenge physical result. Over the course of 5 days the workshop made use of the Amalgam & Sarmada House & Sunflower Theater studios.
The efforts of the Embassy of Switzerland to Lebanon and Syria , Abdo Nawar, Yara Boustany, Zaher Kais and others were essential in providing the appropriate venues for these sessions free of charge. We are excited to start new art classes and host international artists in order to re-establish unfettered dialogue across cultures.
In this workshop, the participants explored a vide range of physicality, through multiple modes of listening; sensorial, imaginary, acoustically, physically and emotionally. Simea usually dive into a collective and simultaneously individual journey to tune participant’s instrument, the body, this drive drive will be our personal curiosities and joy for movement while discovering new possibilities to compose and structure more precise in time and space, alone and together.
This workshop took place in Beirut at Amalgam studio on the 19th and 20th, and Sunflower Thetaer 23rd of February 2022. and on the 12th of February at Beit Sarmada.
About Simea:
Simea Cavelti was born in Switzerland and received a Bachelor degree from the London Contemporary Dance School ‘The Place’ in 2014. The following 3 years she worked in Lebanon, Jordan and Morocco in various collaborative projects. As a freelance dancer she worked across Europe with diverse choreographers and directors such as Fabrice Mazliah, Renate Graziadei, Joshua Monten, Omar Ghayatt, Maria Ursprung, Declan Whitaker (The Field) and Simon McBurney. She has created various short pieces for the stage as well as other spaces (galleries, museums and outdoor spaces) over the past years and showed her work in diverse theatres and festivals in Switzerland, the UK and Italy.
In the context of continuous work in the implementation of the “Beirut Bodies project – Edition 2022”, Beirut Physical Lab organized and hosted a workshop on Wednesday February 9, 2022, at the Sunflower Theatre, with Rowaida El Ghaly, Choreographer and Professor of Acting and Physical Expression at the Lebanese University.
Mrs. El Ghaly provided the participants of the “BeiRoot Bodies” project an opportunity for collective creativity and free expression through their bodies, being the primary driver of creativity. The workshop focused on two main aspects: “the basics of movement” and “the presence of the performer in the theatrical space”. A major part of the workshop also focused on “the performer’s relationship with earth,” through a set of exercises that help performers understand this relationship, and its impact on the quality of movement. In addition, Mrs. El Ghaly provided the participants with a set of tools to use, in order to stimulate their pelvis. This exercise was meant to understand the importance of the pelvis in maintaining balance and straightness of the dancer’s movement, and thus creating greater freedom of his motor expression.
These exercises and many others played a major role in creating awareness in the importance of breathing, and its impact on the performance of dancers and actors. We are very delighted, at Beirut Physical Lab, with our collaboration with Rowaida El Ghaly, and we appreciate the positive difference she made in the “Beirut Bodies” project. We also look forward to collaborate and partner with more Lebanese artists, so that Beirut Physics Lab becomes a safe space for meetings, expression and communication between people who work in the artistic and cultural affairs.
للقراءة باللغة العربية، يمنكم النقر على الصفحة التالية
BeiRoot Bodies, get to know us more… the cities are emerging as a very important part of a person’s identity, we can say that a low level of sense of belonging prevents unity and attachment. Our goal then is to create a planned, systematic and theory-based creative approach to help people of Beirut to overcome the trauma caused by the memories of our city which lead them to disconnect with the country and reject it somehow, and to reconcile its people with it and help them feel connected again and gain a sense of belonging to its community.
In BeiRoot Bodies Project we want to provide a safe space and nurturing environment for Beirut people to connect together, express themselves through the body, communicate conscious and unconscious feelings through movements and help them move past the place where they might be “stuck” in processing the traumatic and anxiety following the Beirut explosion.
BeiRoot Bodies! Here we go
One of the participants in the workshop
Research shows that unresolved trauma can lead to mental and physical health concerns and survivors of trauma are particularly susceptible to somatization; the tendency to experience and communicate psychological distress in the form of somatic symptoms; some psychological symptoms may be so overwhelming that a person cannot face them consciously so the person expresses his/her distress through the body, converting it to a physical symptom which can range from joint pain to temporary loss of vision. Animals recover from stressful events by physically releasing the energy they accumulate, but humans often override these natural ways of regulating the nervous system with feelings of shame, judgments, and fears and deny the body’s opportunity to fully process the traumatic experience and create energy build-up and blockages, that lead to physical and mental health concerns like anxiety and aggression expressed in our daily communication with others.
BeiRoot Bodies and the experience:
People experience the world not only through their thoughts and emotions but also simultaneously through their bodies and since the Body and mind are interconnected so that a change in one impacts the other, our method aims to create an atmosphere that allows individuals to open up, express the memories stored within the body and listen to the common stories that their bodies tell beyond the old systems of defenses used for survival and security in this aggressive country, and let these traumatic memories and tension be released through bodywork and other physical techniques used in theatre, dance and yoga to discover a new way of integrating and being in thecommunity and improving social skills.
للترجمة إلى اللّغة العربية، أنقر على الصفحة الثانية
In this article, we will go over the most prominent contemporary dance performances that the Lebanese choreographer Bassam Bou Diab has participated, or created, or choreographed it. A number of dance shows that we will go through it, such as: “Under the Flesh”, “Eternal” and “Pina My Love” and “The Siege/L’Assedio” with Monica Ciarcelluti. In the following, we will get acquainted with the most prominent performances that Bassam presented, or that are under development.
1- Under The Flesh:
From the performance.
Under the Flesh, is a contemporary dance performance that raises the question of the role of the body in situations of war. How can the body reaction to a death threat, originating from our survival instinct, transform into a dance? A dance based on imaginary rules and techniques that have been meticulously conceived like a fairy tale that helps overcoming the war machine. A personal story is told, the story of a body that outlived four consecutive wars.
The trailer for “Under The Flash”.
The work is anchored in a very specific political context, 4 wars that happened in the South of Lebanon in 1993, 1996, 2000 and 2006. Wars are never-ending in the Middle East and in the context of recent wars and the political migrations happening in Europe, Bassam believes that it is important to talk about the human aspect and the personal flesh experience when one’s life is under threat. The aim at sharing this with the European audience, an aspect not spoken of on the news. The story of a true and painful experience of war situations outside the politics of it.
For 35 minutes Bassam Bou Diab and Ayman Sharaf El-Dien want to place the audience at the core of a death threat situation, throughout the choreography and the music and a storytelling narrated with a specific humor. To complete this dialogue the performers also engage in a (Q&A) session following the performance. It is also possible that Bassam gives sometimes, a workshop that would explore the movement techniques that describes in the performance, and mix that with some folklore techniques with live music.
2- Eternal:
Photo by: Alex Lopez
The performance revolves around the presence of the dancing body, in the revolutions of the Arab Spring, as a political movement that stands in opposition to the existing social and political regimes. It shows the ability of this body to create a rebellious state against these radical systems. This is shown through physical positions and dance movements that are capable of generating a sort of power that can be soft and peaceful, but at the same time influential and captivating to revolutionary communities.
The research of movement focuses on the abstraction of these gestures, and their relation with the music, the cheers, or the songs. It deciphers the symbols and represents them in the form of a contemporary physical theater performance.
3- L’Assedio/The Siege:
A dance-theatre play, an experimental and intercultural artistic project where the dialogue between east and west is at the center of the scenic creation. The fusion of artists from different countries and cultures among which are lebanon, burkina faso, italy, argentina and romania, becomes key to sharing and discussing different themes of oppression.
lebanese choreographer Bassam Bou Diab, and under the direction of monica ciarcelluti, the theater company has carried out a careful study of the gestures from ritual origins of different cultures and in particular focus on the arab world, its religious celebrations and its music traditions. Can these gestures transform into individual and collective actions? Can they depict the world of the victims of a siege, oppression or exclusion?
L’assedio/the siege is based on a gestural grammar an language that draws its base from islamic religious rituals (Prayer, Sufi dance and Ashura) and from their fragmentation, up to joining them in a dynamic form of art accompanied by music. Music becomes an expression tool in a drama combination centered around two fundamental elements, from the classic Greek drama: the chorus and the hero and the evolving relationship between these two. The scenic writing is based not only on the actions and movement but also on the word, sound and voice use through linguistic polyphony. The texts included in the drama come from rewriting of Sartre, Brecht, Camus, Euripides and of current texts of the political and media world.
The meeting between Monica and Bassam. The beginning of their artistic dialogue originated from the need to answer these questions: what is the contemporary idea of europe/western and of non europe/east? Who are the winners and who are the losers nowadays? From these thoughts the scenic writing is born, both through the word and through the study of gestures. How can the religious rituals transform into actions and movements that fuse and transform into individual and collective reactions? An existential work, which reminds of Sartre where ideally there are no leaders and movements are born spontaneously and where the fight is always the result of a collective action.
4- Incontro:
The Italian word Incontro means meeting, the etymology originates from the Latin popular incóntra, composed of the prefix in- (reinforcing) and contra = opposite, against, in front of. A meeting, an encounter confronts us with two forces, which at least one moves towards the other (etymologically, ‘against’), but they are directed towards each other to reach the presence of someone or something. Lebanese choreographer Bassam Abou Diab and Italian Jacopo Jenna create a dialogue between their different choreographic practices to generate an open debate on cultural diversity as a trace of possibilities and an element of definition of the body through movement.
This series of encounters between the two artists is looking for strategies of body meeting through different elements like proximity and mimesis to identify crosscultural variables of body attitude and movement qualities.
5- Pina my Love:
From the rehearsals.
A prison strongly represents a direct and powerful sentence of punishment and a forced limitation of freedom, and human space. However, in addition to that, totalitarian regimes have used this tool to subjugate free speech through intimidation and torture. Bassam Bou Diab brings back his own personal story of imprisonment and pain in an attempt to expand on the situation of prisons and the inhuman brutal practices that the prisoners are subjected towards. As a dancer, considering his body the most important means of expression, how did such an experience change his perception of it, its movement and reactions. In a world of fantasy and stylization how would that body process the means to find its way into the supernatural; to survive the pain and change it into dance in order to fulfill its first and foremost dream.
“Pina my Love” is a contemporary dance performance that examines the psychological and physiological defense mechanisms that the body creates when subjected to torture, in order to preserve its existence, cope and adapt to its new state. The totalitarian or capitalist regimes or other regimes under several names, especially in our Arab regions, aim to break the will of the rebels against it, those who oppose its policies, and the deviants from what is previously decreed, by harming the body as the primary incubator for ideas. They specifically resort to suppressing freedoms through imprisonment, then torture and direct physical intimidation with the aim of transforming the body into a paralyzed voluntary tool that they can control.
“In every ancient culture, there are rituals to mortify the body as a way of understanding that the energy of the soul is indestructible.” – Marina Abramovic. Circles can represent wholeness, a natural sense of completion, like the sun, the moon or any planet. Working on Circular movements creates a union, a sense of belonging to a common safe space where “We” as actors and dancers feel connected and secure. Thus, we can express and communicate freely through our bodies and meet each other physically and intellectually far beyond our racial, class, social, cultural or gender differences, welcoming a flowing energy. Such observation is based on 4 years research on the topic of rituals (religious and social); movement’s repetition and circular energy, By Bassam Bou Diab. In this article you can find out more about Rituals and Movements Workshop by Bassam.
Why? (Motivation)
In order to reach this pure energy, to connect to “The Center”, God or Supreme consciousness in a religious context, one must let go of his false social Identity, or the material movements, unauthentic in another word and put his/her body and voice in the service of the center. And since the circular motion unites us with the center, consequently each movement should starts from the center and returns to the center. When this happens, one’s sense of self begins to dissolve, allowing the person to feel unified with the center (object of intention). These rituals help us to connect to each other by sending our energy to the center through our circular movements. This energy returns to us, as it is an endless, renewable circle and allows us to rediscover our true higher identity where our movements are purely organic.
How? (Techniques)
Rituals and Movements Workshop focuses on a number of rituals used in the Islamic societies. Such as Ritual of Ashura (slapping the chest), Ritual Prayer (Rakaat and Wudhu), Sufi Ritual (Sama). These rituals are based on repetitive movements that its order doesn’t change, and some of it has its clear rhythm. For example, in Sufism the movement changes with the change of the music instrument.
According to this, Bassam Bou Diab runs a workshop about rituals and it is divided into five parts:
Vocal and physical warm up.
Introducing the rituals theoretically and practically (Its origins, its reasons, its goals).
Working on the movements as they are.
Dividing these rituals and working on each part separately.
Working in a circle with the whole group to re-introduce these rituals within a unified rhythm and music so it reinforces ecstasy and induces mystical trance.
Improvisations based on the types of rituals that has been worked on.
Proceeding from the closed circle to a place where each participant creates.
Working on participant’s new ritual.
Where to? (Objectives)
Participants in Rituals and Movements Workshop will acquire a number of rituals rich in movements and take to another dimension with a different value.
Participants will explore the subtle relationship between the breath, movement and rhythm in order to maintain the cycle
Working on a nonstop repetitive circular motion.
Experiencing the cohesion of energy between the group out of the ritual and the closed circle.
Rituals and Movements Workshop’s Duration: Long duration workshop: 5 days, 5hours/day (1hour break in between) Short duration: 1 day for 4 hours (30 minutes break)
A Participant from Rituals and Movements Workshop.
