Monday’s Muse: Anne Teresa De Keersmaeker

A challenging contemporary dance choreographer with a hugely dedicated following, Anne Teresa De Keersmaeker has been described as “a minimalist with a tendency to dramatise – a fascinating contradiction.”

During the early ’80s, De Keersmaeker founded her own company, Rosas, with three other women. Their first work, Rosas Danst Rosas (of which I have mentioned before, here) became their signature piece, and established the company’s distinctly female essence. Since then, she has created a collection of beautiful works that teeter on the edge of being both an art installation and a performance.

But it is her work Work/Travail/Arbeid that is a personal favourite. This piece explored the question: What would it mean for choreography to perform as an exhibition? In response, Anne Teresa De Keersmaeker reworked her piece Vortex Temporum for radically different conditions. Reimagining it as a nine week long exhibition inside a gallery space, accessible to the public and continuously performed during regular opening hours.

I really love her approach to re-working. It’s a concept we often ignore, obsessed with ‘the brand new’ and favouring ‘the never-done-before’. But when there is (even a slice of) value in something you have previously made, why not revisit it, restructure it. Perhaps give it new limitations and find something new…

Anne Teresa De Keersmaeker is Monday’s Muse for reminding me to re-visit, refine and rediscover.

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[Image above shows rehearsals for Work/Travail/Arbeid at WIELS, Brussels, August 2014]