Pelat

• Duration: 40 min
• Spain
• Tout public
• 1107 vues

Joan Català

A man appears with a heavy tree trunk on his shoulder and a zinc bucket. He commences a strange ballet, dictated by his efforts to balance the wood. He turns, bends, lifts, looks around him… Something is happening. Does he want to climb to the top of the pole? And can he do it unassisted? In order to succeed, he will have to join forces and appeal to a sense of solidarity.

Joan Català engages in a poetic dance using only a wooden pole, a bucket, some belts and ropes… with the help of four spectators. To hoist himself to the top of the pole, the artiste uses a carefully ritualized process in which a previously passive group is transformed into a coherent support system around the performance of a single man. It is no longer a show, in the literal sense of the word, more a ceremony, involving and integrating the audience to a greater or lesser degree.

Joan Català uses everyday actions based on childhood observations of his family of ironworkers and the dialogue between men and tools, combined with a feeling for Catalan festivities around a slippery pole, in a performance that is both moving and tense. A solo performance based on observations of physical labour in the world of rural arts and crafts that appeal to the spectator's sense of community. A wonderful moment of solidarity between people.