Body imagery: Migratory effect

Does all migration involve transforming along the way? From telluric movement to the most frenetic dance,Corporal Imaginary: Migratory Effectreflects on the permeability of countries, bodies and ideas, constructing an intangible territory.

The work arises from the meeting between Carlota Berzal (Seville, Spain) and Cristóbal Santa María (Santiago, Chile), both gathered to deploy a scenic research process that rescues otherness, the strange and deformed, as a mixture between both corporalities, generating an artistic coexistence from diversity to embody a new bodily state. Both artists have met through experiences derived from mobility in various territories and now they meet again to investigate a choreographic proposal in accordance with contemporary problems.

This creation process also has the choreographic direction of the outstanding artist Poliana Lima (Brazil) and the dramaturgy of the artist Ricardo Mena Rosado (Mexico).

What the piece proposes to us is to imagine new ways of perceiving dance through listening to the internal echo of bodies and voices, sound archives or traditional Spanish and Chilean music, among others. To achieve this, various gestures of bodily action and a collage of images linked to the global culture that permeates the life experiences of these performers are created.

Released in 2023 as a co-production with Teatros del Canal in Spain, it was widely celebrated by critics. The Diario de Sevilla published: "The best thing about the piece is the choice of a simple approach: two anonymous bodies (a thin jersey leaves their bodies exposed, but covers their faces for a large part of it) walk, run, dance in all directions, on a white rectangle covered by a dark cloth/earth under which they sometimes hide to ward off dangers or to wait for the opportunity to move. Their walk, their dance is sometimes sinuous and sometimes frenetic, but always determined, stopping only when it is necessary to go unnoticed, or when it is necessary to change direction.

Original Idea: Cristóbal Santa María Cea | Creation, Production and Performers: Carlota Berzal, Cristóbal Santa María Cea | Address: Poliana Lima | Dramaturgy: Ricardo Mena Rosado | Sound Space: Álvaro Mansilla Villalpando | Documents: Fernando Vílchez | Lighting: Jesús Díaz Cortés | Costumes: Gloria Trenado
Resident company in Creation of the Canal Choreographic Center, with the support of the Teatros del Canal and Comunidad de Madrid. This work is part of the Andalusian Network of Theaters and Red Teatros de la Comunidad de Madrid 2025. It has been selected to be part of Andalusian companies in Tanzmesse 2024. Best Lighting in Pad Awards 2023.