Maker | Danstheater AYA & Silbersee |
Duration | 60 min |
Moving dance and music performance about the relationship between a white mother and a black child.
"Shit! There they are again. The street is empty and I can only go straight ahead. Don't look back. How long will mom believe it when I say I just fell..."
A mother sees that her black child is up against different boundaries than she is used to. It feels helpless when you are looked at differently because of your skin color. Disbelief strikes. But you can't let your child be someone else. Yearning for understanding and acceptance intrudes. When is the moment you, as a mother, take action?
A story that deserves to be told in words, music, dance and song.
Mother's White is a dance and musical theater production by Dance Theater AYA and Silbersee. Silbersee makes free-form opera that speaks any language. Artistic director and founder Romain Bischoff creates encounters between creators and performers with diverse backgrounds from classical to urban. In doing so, the human voice is central: it is our key to the spectator's heart. AYA's dance and Sibersee's music are accessible to a young and multicolored audience.
Choreographer Ryan Djojokarso trained as a dancer at Codarts and has developed as
a versatile creator. He received the 2017 BNG Bank Dance Award for promising choreographer and was nominated for the Dutch Dance Days Young Audience Award. He was attached to Korzo within the Nieuwe Makersregeling and made the large hall production Libi insooperation with Scapino Ballet and Zuiderstrandtheater.
Ryan's fascinations: "The stories I want to tell stem from quite personal, sometimes
autobiographical experiences. I am fascinated by human behavior and how we often
want to hide. Behind stuff, behind others, behind expectations. Is it human behavior? Is it almost animalistic? I also use the movements and behavior of animals as inspiration for dance material. Just like the playful elements from sports and games. I think it is important that children are introduced to dance and performances. They need to see much more and experience the magic of theater. Something I myself missed in my youth in Suriname. I find the honesty and imagination of children enriching. And I find it important to use humor as a weapon to address difficult themes."
Dance is a language that comes in very directly. AYA offers young people and children the chance to let dance play an important role in their lives. With performances that dare. Raw and unpolished, beyond beauty and vanity. The dancers and actors of AYA use their personality to touch and seduce the audience. They are strong and vulnerable at the same time.
AYA was founded in 1990 by artistic director and choreographer Wies Bloemen, initially as a
dance company for adults. From the moment AYA achieves national and international success with Bronsttijd (1996) - a youth performance about sexuality and falling in love - AYA focuses specifically on a young audience. Amazement, curiosity and social commitment are always at the heart of the work. AYA does not strive for an aesthetic perception of beauty but looks for what lies behind the facade. "That unruly, generous, brash, unruly, endearing audience of ours. Hard as granite, sensitive as a snail's antennae. Ever young, eternally new." (Wies Bloemen)
Silbersee is a kaleidoscopic company. A somewhat chaotic family of kindred spirits around singer and farmer's son Romain Bischoff. Rooted in opera, but with the windows and doors wide open to idiosyncratic talents from a wide variety of genres and disciplines. With the voice as the primal instrument, Silbersee gives sound to that which needs to be heard. That which really matters; themes such as inclusion, ecology and artificial intelligence. We enjoy collaborating with others and creating performances about the world of today and the world of the future.
Director & choreographer | Ryan Djojokarso |
Musical dramaturgy | Romain Bischoff |
Dance | Lenna Maarte schouten & Sherise Strang |
Composer & musician | Akim Moiseenkov |
Performer & singer | Maya alban Zapata |
Libretto | Sjaan Flikweert |
Sound design | Maurits Thiel |
Light design | Ate Jan van Kampen |
Advisor | Jan van den Bossche & Jappe Groenendijk |
Rehearsel photography | Sjoerd Derine |
Korzo Zaal