A captivating mystical ritual and an irregular dramatic game

March is dance time. The Fifteenth Metropolitan Dance Festival is a festival promoted by Barcelona City Council, in which up to twelve municipalities in the metropolitan area collaborate to spread dance far and wide. The eighth edition has arrived with more than 100 performances in theaters, squares, and streets, in addition to other parallel activities scheduled from March 14 to 30. The National Theater (TNC) is collaborating with two interesting and very diverse proposals.

In the Sala Gran, the British company Humanhood, led by Rudi Cole and Sitges-born Júlia Robert, presents this ∞ {Infinity} that passed through the Mercat de les Flors in 2022 and which gives birth to so-called mystical dance. And certainly, the proposal is a penetrating ritual that draws on the airs of the East, but also of Africa (at least that's how it seems). It's a sensitive journey amidst fabulous twilight that begins with a dance/yoga session. Elegant, rounded, harmonious movements that show in detail the entire arc of movement, set to an electronic soundtrack not too far removed from the sounds of Tangerine Dream. Without abandoning the world of mists and shadows, whose exquisite lighting provides us with splendid moving tableaux, the proposal maintains coherence throughout five tableaux evocative of the encounter between earth and sky, between light and darkness. Magnificent male and female dancers, dedicated to the company's peculiar way of understanding dance. And after a sober greeting, they continue the ritual with a circle and the mudra of joined hands. The curtain falls and the audience continues applauding. Bravo!

The ingenuity of Jordi Oriol

In a very different territory, and in the Sala Tallers, Jordi Oriol puts his undoubted ingenuity at the service of a dance company, Hotel Col·lectiu Escènic, seeking to transfer syntactical and polysemic games to a silent dramaturgy and, in a certain sense, to movement. Suite 4. Do not disturb It's an exercise in which the five performers excel: Laia Duran, Rober Gómez, Anna Hierro, Èlia López, and Lorena Nogal, winner of the 2024 National Dance Award and dancer at La Veronal. However, Jordi Oriol's dramaturgy doesn't stand out, despite a good start with a classic game of technical malfunctions, well-executed by the performers. The metaphor of the hard-working dancers as laborers on public works projects awaiting the call that will change their lives works for a while, but soon becomes monotonous, somewhat repetitive. Luckily, the comical notes, some impressive group choreographic phrases, and Lorena Nogal's solo enrich a proposal reflected in Peeping Tom from which we expected something more.