LOVE WILL TEAR US APART 

Love will tear us apart, first part of a trilogy dedicated to relationship between contemporary dance and a specific genre of pop music, is a solo created for performer Petra Hrašćanec. The work itself fuses several genres and is somewhere between a rock concert, confession and abstract dance. The question of ownership over the performance at first was positioned within an abstract dance frame dealing only with the body and the politics of observation, extremely expanding into a broader arts and social context. Love in the title relates to love for dance, the act of dance itself, while the work debates the difference between dance and its realization as a social event through the constitution and definition of the performer herself. Performer Petra Hrašćanec executes dance numbers, chosen love songs, while in the intermission we are to learn about seemingly ephemeral details about the origins of this production, weaving a fine net of relationships between powers which define the act of performance. The audience is invited to actively take on the responsibility about the sequences in the hierarchy of the act of performing.

Petra Hrašćanec and Saša Božić have been active on the Croatian and European dance and theatre scene for a number of years in various formats and production environments. Their collaborations always insist on the procedural nature of artwork, invention of stage discourses and playing with various performance dispositions.

In the field of performing arts, Petra Hrašćanec is active as a dancer, choreographer and pedagogue. The main point of her interest and education is contemporary dance whereas her works are characterised by a specific use of a host of different media to investigate the body and corporeality. Hrašćanec is also an active external member of Francesco Scavetta's WEE COMPANY based in Norway. As a choreographer, Petra Hrašćanec creates either as a member of the artistic organization 21:21 (as one of the art directors) or in collaboration with the partnership organisation de_facto and a host of Croatian institutions (&TD Theatre, The Zagreb Youth Theatre, Pogon Jedinstvo, The Zagreb Dance Centre). Since 2013, Hrašćanec is a lecturer and a mentor leading the programme for contemporary dance technique at the Dance Department of the Academy of Dramatic Art in Zagreb, Croatia.

Saša Božić is active in various artistic fields ranging from theatre directing, choreography and creation of dramatic text to organization of promotional cultural actions and strategic planning of culture projects. As a dramaturge, Božić collaborates with renowned choreographers and dancers in Croatia and abroad. Along with a host collaborative projects, Saša Božić accomplished a number of independent dramatic, dance and multimedia projects that are currently part of the repertoire of the main Croatian theatre institutions. Also, Božić successfully and regularly presents his collaborations in European theatre institutions, i.e. Hebbel am Ufer in Berlin, Gessnerallee in Zurich, National Dance Centre in Oslo, Bitef in Belgrade, MESS in Sarajevo, Zuricher Theater spektakel in Zurich, Karantena in Dubrovnik. He also works as an assistant professor at the Acting Department of the Academy of Dramatic Art in Zagreb.

The creations of Petra Hrašćanec and Saša Božić are presented at renowned European dance festivals and theaters, such as: Rencontres Choreographiques Internationales de Seine-Saint-Denis, Paris, UOVO festival in Milano, Dance centre La Jette in Bruxelles, Les Subsistances in Lyon, Theatre de la Bastille in Paris, among others. 

Concept and Choreography: Saša Božić / Petra Hrašćanec

Performed by: Petra Hrašćanec

Music selection: Saša Božić / Petra Hrašćanec

Sound: Damir Šimunović

Costumes: Zdravka Ivandija Kirigin

Producers: Štefica Bartolin, Andrea Remetin

Photo and video: Neven Petrović / Danko Stjepanović

Produced by: de facto