IKARUS, stirb oder flieg

Regional Brugg

original in German

Marianne Spiess, Regional Brugg, 30.05.2019

Hochparterre

original in German

Icarus as Surveyor of the Room

A monastery church becomes the setting for a contemporary dance production: in Königsfelden, architecture, choreography, art and music form an unusual liaison.

Brigitta Luisa Merki, Founder and Artistic Director of “tanz&kunst königsfelden”, does not want the audience to interpret the myth of Icarus as a premonitory parable for human hubris. Rather, her latest production tells about the eternal dream of flying, complete with falls and renewed flaps of the wings. An international dance ensemble choreographed by both Merki and renowned Canadian artist Rob Kitsos presents this cycle of failure and resilience in the Königsfelden Monastery Church in Windisch. Icarus and his flying companions help each other take to the air, only to be pulled back down again by gravity. Thus, they function as ‘surveyors of the historic sacral space’ with new means to render its scale and the vertical dimensions of the architecture visible. While the artistic installation and the architecture of the church appear inharmonious, Christoph Huber’s music – specially composed for the production and performed by a small ensemble – spreads a spherical carpet that weaves together the diverse ingredients of the interdisciplinary evening. Thus, the audience is surprised by the sudden Spanish guitar sounds emerging from the floating music being played and by the transformation of the contemporary dance to the flamenco, which suddenly becomes rhythmic and very organized, only to revert to flowing individual movements. Again, circular movements and constant change, as if the myth of Icarus also told the familiar story of repeat attempts to combine that which is seemingly incompatible.  

Marcel Bächtiger, Hochparterre, 29.05.2019

General Anzeiger

original in German

Claudia Marek, General Anzeiger, 29.05.2019

Aargauer Zeitung

original in German

We are all Icarus

(…) Together, Rob Kitsos, Choreographer, Dancer and Performer, and Brigitta Luisa Merki, Artistic Director of Tanz & Kunst Königsfelden, created a production that explores the sacral space in a most sensitive way (…)

(…) The interior design is exemplarily conceived to fit the Königsfelden Monastery Church. After the outstanding settings of past productions, Roman Sonderegger’s towering anthracite sculptures – reminiscent of fans, wings and rocks – now enthrall current audiences.

(…) Falling, getting back on one’s feet and flying again: it applies to all of us, for we are all Icarus.

Elisabeth Feller, Aargauer Zeitung, 27.05.2019