Moving an audience is easy, just as football, a soap opera or an excess of decibels can. Homo sapiens is a fragile, vulnerable being, and we don’t control our emotions. But what’s really difficult is to move spectators through an aesthetic reflection that makes us know and recognize ourselves and change. And that’s just what Asier Zabaleta manages to do: he goes beyond emotions, and creates critical evolution. With social responsibility and private worries (common sense, atavism, religion, identity, pain, grief, the reasons behind a performance) as his starting point, he takes the struggles and contradictions of contemporary life onto the stage; sometimes they’re sharp, other times ironic, but they’re always precise and clear, never getting lost at the crossroads. Boundaries which are also cliffs if you touch them with a fingertip or a toe. Theatrical language is always at the service of deep reflections and stories, and the different disciplines which are added to dance – music, theatre – enrich and strengthen it, both in terms of choreography and the catharsis which dance leads us to. Dance as freeware.
Next time we’re moved, let’s know why we are.
HARKAITZ CANO
-MEETING POINT-
MAX PRICE FOR THE BEST STREET SHOW AT XXI MAX PRICES OF SCENIC ARTS 2018
ERTZA was created by the dancer and choreographer Asier Zabaleta (Ezkio, Gipuzkoa 1.972) in 2004, with the aim of finding a new space in which different artistic disciplines could work together through contemporary dance.
ERTZA productions question human and societal contradictions, reaching different audiences with productions for stage and public spaces.
ERTZA works have been performed in countries including: China, Philippines, Brazil, Peru, Costa Rica, El Salvador, México, Israel, Russia, Mozambique, Corea, Hungary, Lithuania, Luxemburg, Switzerland, Germany, France, Italy, Greece, Poland, Portugal and Spain.
In parallel with the artistic production, ERTZA has launched several professional and public education projects.
MASTER CLASSES & WORKSHOPS:
Maputo (Mozambique), Bayonne (France), Geneva (Switzerland), Manila (Philippines), Salvador de Bahía (Brazil), Belo Horizonte (Brazil), Porto Alegre (Brazil), Ipatinga (Brazil), Recife (Brazil), Heredia (Costa Rica), Chelyabinsk (Russia), San Luis Potosí (Mexico), Maspalomas, Seville, Burgos, Madrid, San Sebastian and Bilbao (Spain).
ARTISTIC RESIDENCIES:
Bayonne and Biarritz (France), Salvador de Bahía (Brazil), Belo Horizonte (Brazil), Chelyabinsk (Russia), Burgos (Spain), San Sebastian and Bilbao.
– First Prize in the XMASDANZA Solo Contest, Canary Islands. With “EGO”.
– Three Prizes in the XXII Madrid Choreography Competition:
1.Residence at “Centro Coreográfico Galego”,
2.Prize for touring
3.Prize from “Fundación AISGE” to a relevant dancer Eneko Gil.
With “Bihar jaio nintzen”
First Prize for the Best Contemporary Choreography in Chelyabinsk (Russia) and Two Nominations in the “GOLDEN MASC OF RUSSIA” (Russian National dance and theatre prizes) in the categories of Best Contemporary Dance Production and Best Choreographer. With “Next in Line” (2010) created for “Chelyabinsk Contemporary Dance Theatre”
– Prize for the Best Basque Show at “UMORE AZOKA 2014” of Leioa, Basque Country.
– Prize for Artistic Trajectory in the XIII Dance Prizes. Association of Dance Professionals of Gipuzkoa.
– Prize for the Best Basque Street Show at “UMORE AZOKA 2017”of Leioa, with the show “MEETING POINT”.
-MAX PRICE FOR THE BEST STREET SHOW AT XXI MAX PRICES OF SCENIC ARTS.
