‘SEQUENCE #1’ – Practices Of The (Un)Visible: The Operating Body And The Double Vision - Performative Lecture

At the origin of my works is the gaze as a physical place of perception, capture and assembly, which places the body in a landscape of multiple narratives where its presence can be displaced, altered and questioned. Some time ago I wrote that "the gaze is what makes the empty space between bodies disappear". In this presentation of my work I am going to name and communicate a vocabulary principle belonging to numerous (non) visible practices inscribed in the dramaturges of my scenic, audiovisual and performative works. The body-operator and the double vision are configured within the devices that I have been articulating from the body, being pillar concepts of my spatialized and cinematographic choreographic writing. I seek to configure their presence within a field of battle and experimentations, around (non) fictional places of encounters and common memories. To propose points of contact and frictions between what she shows and what she hides, between what she perceives and what she thinks, between the real and the imaginary.

* Practices of the (non) visible: the operating body and the double vision was made expressly for SEQUENCE #1. During the performative conference, Olga Mesa showed some texts and shadows of images that were projected on a wall in the background, the projector covered it and uncovered it at will, she wrote in white chalk on paper some texts and placed them on one of the side walls. Just as he moved through the space, approaching and looking at the audience.

Olga Mesa. Choreographer and visual artist, she is one of the key figures of contemporary Spanish dance. Since the 1990s, her search for a personal and renewed writing of the body has led her to affirm the intimate part in the performance, through a construction that combines expression and perception. Her stage pieces are mainly developed in thematic projects: the body trilogy 'Res, non verba' (1996-1999), the cycle in five movements 'More public, more private' (2001-2006) and the project 'labOfilm' (2010-2012).
For ten years he has worked with the off-format artist Francisco Ruiz de Infante in the construction of the choreographic, plastic and audiovisual project 'Carmen // Shakespeare' (2012-2022). Together, they run the company Hors Champ // Out of Field, creating contexts and practices for interdisciplinary arts.
Based in Strasbourg since 2005, their company's stage creations have been presented in various festivals and artistic institutions in France, Spain, Portugal, the United States, Switzerland, Italy, Germany, Austria, England, Uruguay, Chile, Brazil, Argentina, Morocco, Mali, etc.

SEQUENCE is a cycle of activities linked to the programming of the Fabra i Coats: Centre d'Art Contemporani de Barcelona. SEQUENCE #1 proposed a framework to delve into the particular performative link between bodies and images.