Silvia Gribaudi: Graces

Graces is a project inspired by The Three Graces, sculpture created by Antonio Canova between 1812 and 1817.

The work draws from mythology. Zeus’ three daughters - Euphrosyne, Aglaea and Thalia – radiated splendour, joy and prosperity. Three male figures take the stage in a space and time suspended between the human and the abstract: a place where male and female meet, without roles, and dance to the rhythm of nature itself.

On stage there are three male performers (Giacomo Citton, Matteo Marchesi, Andrea Rampazzo) together with the author Silvia Gribaudi, who likes to define herself as ‘author of the body’ because her poetics elevates imperfections to an art form with a direct, cruel and empathetic comic style without any boundaries among dance, theatre and performing arts.

Over the past ten years, Silvia Gribaudi has been questioning gender sterotypes, female and male identities and the concept of virtuosity in dance and daily life, expanding beyond clichés and appearances.

“Drawn from the sculpture The Three Graces (Antonio Canova 1812-1817) - - the three male performers together with Silvia search for new meanings of the word ‘grace’. With dance and text, but most of all with warmth and lightness, the performance reveals a core of our humanity.” – Annette Van Zwoll, dramaturg

“Silvia is the Italian prophet of free body. Not a tumbling, gymnastic body, which is so connected to strength and muscles, but a truly free body, that has set itself free from the obligations and duties to which so many cultures have forced it. It is a vital and healthy principle to consider how the idea of something Beautiful is culturally relative. Splendour, joy, prosperity radiate from The Three Graces, three cardinal points set by Canova into marble, which Gribaudi manages to set free from time and gender stereotypes, and reveals through the balm of irony”. – Roberto Canziani in Quantescene! Cose di Teatro

Graces was realised thanks to the critical, visual and directorial support of Matteo Maffesanti (director, social theatre operator and videomaker) who followed through the entire artistic process with Silvia Gribaudi, with several working phases involving workshops for local people inspired by the choreographic material developed in the project.

Bio: Silvia Gribaudi

Silvia Gribaudi is an Italian choreographer who also specialises in performing arts in general. Since 2004 she has focused her research on the social impact of bodies, having set at the centre of her choreographic language the comic element and the relationship between audience and performers.

Gribaudi’s shows have been featured in a number of national and international festivals and are the result of a creative process that focuses on dialogue and on the poetic encounter with other artists, dance companies, and communities.

Silvia Gribaudi is one of the Big Pulse Dance Alliance Scaling Up artists.