at 9 pm
Lecture via Zoom (in English)
The event is free of charge
ZOOM LINK:
Meeting ID: 893 8899 7842
Passcode: 486869
In the lecture, the author will present the recently published book Ksenija, Xenia, London Dance Years of Xenia Hribar, 1960-1970 (Maska in co-publishing partnership with JSKD and Nomad Dance Academy Slovenija) and tackle two of the artist’s episodes, which are directly and indirectly related to the topic of the choreo-vocalist. The first is about one event, when Xenia Hribar wrote two critical texts shortly after she left the ballet ensemble of the Ljubljana Opera for Naši razgledi (Our Views), which dissected the work of this institution. The second concerns her performance in the show Mass, in which she performed as a member of the London Contemporary Dance Theatre in the spring of 1973, and where the Russian composer Vladimir Rodozianko worked with the ensemble, they created dance materials with choreo-vocal elements together with dancers.
Book Ksenija, Xenia, London Dance Years of Xenia Hribar 1960-1978 is a cultural history of contemporary dance, which reconstructs the British contemporary dance story in order to find the dancer and choreographer Xenia Hribar, give her a voice and tell the story from her perspective. She is accompanied at her dance beginnings, during her first visit to London, in particular in connection with the Dance Foundation by philanthropist, patron and dance lover Robin Howard (1924 – 1989), who is among others credited with the founding of London Contemporary Dance School (1965), the London Contemporary Dance Group and the London Contemporary Dance Theatre (1967 – 1994) and the establishment of The Place dance centre, which celebrated its 50th anniversary in 2019. In the years when she was a student (1965 – 1967) and a member of ensembles (1967 – 74), Xenia met with exceptional names from the world of contemporary dance, art and journalism, worked with a range of encyclopaedic choreographers and performed at large venues of the contemporary dance world. The book concludes her British contemporary dance story in the years when she studied and lectured at the University of Victoria in Manchester and then spent two years returning home. It ends in the time when she began toying with the idea that the British contemporary dance story could be replicated in Ljubljana.
Rok Vevar is a theatreologist, curator, dramaturg, publicist and historian of contemporary dance. Between 1997 and 2011 he published theatrical and dance reviews and essays in domestic and foreign periodicals. The period was concluded with the book Submission Deadline: Selection of Reviews and Articles (Litera, 2011). In 2012 he founded the Temporary Slovenian Dance Archive, which in 2017 got its space at the Metelkova Museum of Contemporary Art in Ljubljana. In 2018, he edited the book Night, Day + Man = Rhythm: Anthology of Slovenian Contemporary Dance Publishing 1918-1960 (Maska, JSKD, Nomad Dance Academy Slovenija) and wrote several study chapters for it that contextualize the period in question. He is a member of the Balkan contemporary dance network Nomad Dance Academy and Nomad Dance Academy Slovenija, in the framework of which he co-curates CoFestival, the international festival of contemporary dance (since 2012). Prior to that, he and Sinja Ožbolt founded the Ukrep – festival of dance perspectives, which he co-created from 2008 to 2012. He received the Xenia Hribar Award for history and dance theory (2019) and the Vladimir Kralj Award (2020) for his achievements in the field of theatrology between 2018 and 2020.