The new choreographic program called 1|2|3 was developed by the Suzanne Dellal Centre in Tel Aviv presented at the Holland Dance Festival.
The program encourages the development of young upcoming Israel and Arab choreographers, and several new works created by this program were presented at the festival earlier this year.
The Israeli Embassy in the Netherlands supported the participation of 25 Israeli dancers who took part in three performances in a festival in Hague. The Embassy also hosted a reception at the event.
The festival programmers wrote of the collaboration, “In the world of contemporary dance, the work of Israeli choreographers has occupied a prominent place for years. The tense situation in which the citizens of Israel continuously live, seems to reflect itself in contemporary dance: many choreographers from Israel are bold, if not aggressive, dynamic, and provocative. It’s filled with a fighting spirit and there’s always something brewing just underneath the surface, which makes even the most lyrical dance pieces highly charged. That makes it interesting for an international dance biennial to stay on the ball and closely follow the latest developments in Israeli dance.”
The program featured three phases, in which the choreographers created a solo, a duet, and a trio. A jury selected the most promising choreographers out of a large group.
The performance opened with an exceptionally vibrant show by Dancing Outside, a pre-professional program at the Suzanne Dellal Centre offering young dancers – who are 19 and 20 years old – the opportunity to prepare themselves for their professional career and to prove themselves in the work of established choreographers.
The performance was a popular and critical success and more collaborations are being planned.