Alessandro Sciarroni, Associate artist of CENTQUATRE-Paris and Triennale Milano Teatro 2022-2024, and recipient of the Golden Lion for Lifetime Achievement in Dance at the 2019 Venice Biennale, brings his bold yet graceful work of theatrical social dance to PS21.
The polka chinata (crouched polka) is a rarity in ballroom dancing: it was performed exclusively by pairs of men. It originated in Bologna around 1900 and had nearly disappeared when Giancarlo Stagni, a professor and dance master, rediscovered it in the 1990s and began teaching it to his dancers. Theater-maker and choreographer Alessandro Sciarroni, whose work inhabits the tension between tradition and modernity, found the dance, its hypnotic nature, and its near-extinction fascinating.
“Alessandro Sciarroni is a choreographer with the identity card of a thespian, he’s a dance researcher with the soul of a visual artist, he examines loneliness but loves the emotional exchange between performers and spectators.” — La Repubblica
In Sciarroni’s Save the Last Dance for Me, PS21’s open-air pavilion theater becomes a fantastical town square where the nearly extinct Bolognese polka chinata is brought back to life before the assembled crowd. After the performance the audience is invited to learn the steps of this bold and theatrical social dance in workshops with the performers.
Immediately after the performance, Sciarroni’s dancers Giovanfrancesco Giannini and Gianmaria Borzillo will lead free workshops in the polka chinata for dancers and non-dancers alike, diving into the form and invoking the spirit of the community to save the dance from the brink of extinction. Open to all, no dance experience necessary!
PS21/Chatham’s PATHWAYS is a multidisciplinary public initiative of free and affordable performances, classes, workshops, and events tailored to the local community. PATHWAYS resides at the intersection of nature and the arts, incorporating PS21’s green, reconfigurable theater and our 100-acres of trails and meadows for site-specific performances and encounters. Beyond our grounds, PS21 brings PATHWAYS to communities throughout our region with programs in city parks, libraries, village streets, farms, and parking lots, all offered free of charge.
Alessandro Sciarroni’s Save the Last Dance for Me is supported in part by Jack Shainman Gallery.
