Chasing a Ghost
In Chasing a Ghost, Alexandra Bachzetsis continuously creates a double — a double body, a double sound, a double space, a double image. Challenging the choreographic archetype of the duet, Chasing a Ghost stages these doubles within a spectrum of violence and desire. Central to this duality, a double in itself, is the notion of the uncanny: an estranging phenomenon in a seemingly ordinary context, but also the potential act of transgression as our repressed impulses and subconsciousness may at any time rupture into our experience of reality.
Chasing a Ghost encompasses a choreography for five dancers (including the artist herself), an original music score played live by two pianists, and a stage setting that shifts between live movement and moving image. These elements are in constant relationship, but the connections between them are intentionally disturbed. Bachzetsis transforms the duet into an unsettling image, the movement between two bodies a distressing and unexpected occurrence, a perpetual “folie-à-deux” that challenges how we look at ourselves and others.
is a choreographer and visual artist based in Basel and Zurich. Her practice unfolds at the intersection of dance, performance, the visual arts and theatre, generating a conflation of the spaces in which the body, as an artistic and critical apparatus, can manifest. Much of Bachzetsis’s work involves choreographies of the body and, in particular, the way that popular culture provides source material for gesture, expression, identification, and fantasy as we continually create and re-create our bodies and the way we identify. Her latest performances have been coproduced by Tate Modern, Documenta 14, MoMA NY, the Art Institute Chicago and Centre Pompidou.
Credits
Concept, choreography Alexandra Bachzetsis Collaboration concept, stage Sotiris Vasiliou Creation, performance Alexandra Bachzetsis, Johanna Willig-Rosenstein, Owen Ridley-DeMonick, Gabriel Schenker, Sotiris Vasiliou Music arrangement, performance Simon Bucher, Mischa Cheung Sound concept Lies Vanborm Curator Hendrik Folkerts Dramaturgy Dorota Sajewska Costume design, fashion design Léa Dickely, Hung La / Kwaidan Edition Costume design, conceptual advice, research Christian Hersche Costume design, styling Priska Morger, Eva Bühler Communication design Julia Born Photography Mathilde Agius First photography assistant Andreas Warren Matti Second photography assistant Fabienne Watzke Hair and makeup shooting Stephanie Kunz Technical direction, light design Patrik Rimann Sound engineering Jonas Häni Technical support tour Matyas Bokor Management, tour management Regula Schelling, Franziska Schmidt Production Association All Exclusive, Regula Schelling, Franziska Schmidt – Commissioned by The Art Institute of Chicago. Supported by the cooperative support agreement between the City of Zurich, the Canton of Zurich, and Pro Helvetia – Swiss Arts Council, Ernst and Olga Gubler-Hablützel Foundation, Stanley Thomas Johnson Foundation, Migros-Kulturprozent, Sophie and Karl Binding Foundation. Co-produced by Art Gallery of Ontario, Mudam Luxembourg, PACT Zollverein (Essen), Tanzquartier Wien, Bundeskunsthalle Bonn, Julidans (Amsterdam), Gessnerallee Zürich. This performance is a co-production in the frame of the Programmers’ Fund of Reso – Dance Network Switzerland, supported by Pro Helvetia – Swiss Arts Council. In-kind Sponsorship: Yamaha Pianos, provided by Yamaha Artist Services (New York), Kwaidan Editions (London). Additional thanks to Cynthia Leung, Edward Traskowski, Paul B. Preciado, Adam Szymczyk, Verena Bachzetsis, Jannis Tsingaris, André Desponds, Aphroditi Antoniou, Raphael Hefti, and Li Tavor.