{"id":5177,"date":"2026-10-25T20:22:51","date_gmt":"2026-10-25T20:22:51","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/cofestival.si\/2026\/?p=5177"},"modified":"2026-10-25T20:23:00","modified_gmt":"2026-10-25T20:23:00","slug":"zhana-penkova-pencheva-vsec-mi-je-ko-me-opazujes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cofestival.si\/2026\/en\/zhana-penkova-pencheva-vsec-mi-je-ko-me-opazujes\/","title":{"rendered":"Zhana Penkova Pencheva: I Love When You\u2019re Watching Me (2025)"},"content":{"rendered":"Monday, 30 November 2026, at 8:30 pm<\/b>
\n<\/b>Old Power Station
\n<\/span>solo dance performance
\n<\/span><\/i>Duration: 50 min.<\/span>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

Tickets: 10\/12 EUR<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n

Please note: Stroboscope effects are used in this performance. In certain scenes, the performer is nude.<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n

Falling in love awakens in us the need to objectify ourselves in the gaze of the loved one. When it comes to choreography, this is an operation towards which we have a highly ambivalent relationship. In her solo, Zhana Penkova Pencheva does not create an object of desire, but instead choreographs objectified desire.<\/span><\/p>\n

In dance, the operation of self-objectification, undertaken in order to inhabit another one’s desire, may have several outcomes. One is form, the other is body. The first is a shell, the second is time. Nothing provokes greater resistance in experienced dance audiences than the moment when a dancing body tries to place itself within the viewer’s desire through its own disembodied form \u2212 completing the process with a body shape that, in certain cases, has already been fixed for years prior to the performance we are watching. In the production of optical data, we often ask ourselves in dance whether choreography could not simply be replaced by computer animation, since the body before us needs no time within itself: it is not in the process of becoming, but rather, already finished, merely fitting itself into spatial contours prescribed in advance. A shell, into which mirrors have burrowed.<\/span><\/p>\n

Something quite different from these dance forms is a body that makes and remakes itself, forms and transforms itself within another’s desire, within the focus of a gaze that reaches its very skin. It is innervated in an entirely different way. Zhana Penkova Pencheva’s solo <\/span>I Love When You\u2019re Watching Me <\/span><\/i>(2025) creates a bodily, or choreographic, love letter: a body that lives within the scrutiny of the person it loves. A body that “corresponds” with its lover, a body born out of its relationship to the one it addresses. A body that, in another’s desire, becomes embodied rather than merely shaped. This happens when we are in love, but also within the sexual relationship with a loved one. The way Zhana Penkova Pencheva embodies herself in her solo is an exceptionally refined study of the climate of an (absent) lover who is nonetheless with her. It is neither a desolation nor a desert, but rather a landscape before the storm whose outcome we cannot yet determine. A body occupied with the imperfective verbs of the heart. A body that listens to itself. A territory of choreographic embodiment before which we cannot remain indifferent.<\/span><\/p>\n

Dance: <\/span>Zhana Penkova Pencheva
\n<\/b>Music: <\/span>Tsvetan Momchilov
\n<\/b>Lighting and Stage Design: <\/span>Ralitsa Toneva
\n<\/b>Photo & Video Documentation: <\/span>Gergely<\/b><\/p>\n

Co-Production by: <\/span>Garage Collective, ICC and Zhana <\/b>Pencheva
\n<\/b>With the partnership of: <\/span>Toplocentrala, Sofia<\/b><\/p>\n

Organised by NDA Slovenija and Kino \u0160i\u0161ka in collaboration with Zavod Bunker<\/span>
\n<\/span>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Monday, 30 November 2026, at 8:30 pm Old Power Station solo dance performance Duration: 50 min. Tickets: 10\/12 EUR Please note: Stroboscope effects are used in this performance. In certain scenes, the performer is nude. Falling in love awakens in us the need to objectify ourselves in the gaze of the loved one. When it […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":5178,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5177","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-cofestival"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cofestival.si\/2026\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5177","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cofestival.si\/2026\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cofestival.si\/2026\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cofestival.si\/2026\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cofestival.si\/2026\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5177"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/cofestival.si\/2026\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5177\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5179,"href":"https:\/\/cofestival.si\/2026\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5177\/revisions\/5179"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cofestival.si\/2026\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/5178"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cofestival.si\/2026\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5177"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cofestival.si\/2026\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5177"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cofestival.si\/2026\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5177"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}