ARCHIVE by Arkadi Zaides

Event time: 
Tuesday, March 3, 2015 - 2:00pm to 4:00pm
Location: 
Off Broadway Theater See map
41 Broadway
New Haven, CT 06511
Admission: 
Free
Open to: 
General Public
Event description: 

Based on footage filmed by volunteers of the B’Tselem Camera Project

Performance followed by discussion

 

 

The artist’s related installation Capture Practice will be on view at the Off Broadway Theater Thursday, March 5 - Saturday, March 7.

HOURS
Thursday - Friday | 3 - 8 PM
Saturday | noon to 4 PM

Presented with support from the Council on Middle East Studies, Macmillan Center for International Studies; the Department of Theater Studies; Joseph Slifka Center for Jewish Life at Yale; Office of the University Chaplain; Orville H. Schell, Jr. Center for International Human Rights,Yale Law School; and the Program in Judaic Studies

 


The dancer and choreographer Arkadi Zaides presents his new work, Archive, based on video filmed by volunteers of the B’tselem Camera Project. B’Tselem, the Israeli Information Center for Human Rights in the Occupied Territories, distributes cameras to Palestinians living in high-conflict areas. Participants document human rights violations and expose the reality of life under the occupation. Through his appropriation of gestures and voices, Zaides engages with the materials and embodies them, turning his body into a living archive.

 

Detailed Notes

B’Tselem is The Israeli Information Center for Human Rights in the Occupied Territories. In 2007
the organization initiated a project, in which video cameras are distributed to Palestinians living in
high-conflict areas. The project aims to provide an ongoing documentation of human rights
violations and to expose the reality of life under occupation to both the Israeli and international
public.

In his new work Arkadi Zaides deepens his artistic exploration of the ongoing conflict in
Israel/Palestine. Materials filmed by volunteers of the B’Tselem Camera Project are selected and
reviewed. Zaides brings the viewers’ attention to the bodies of Israelis (settlers and soldiers), as
they have been depicted on camera, and to the physical reactions to which they resort in various
confrontational situations. The Palestinians remain behind the camera. Nevertheless, their
movement, voice and point of view are highly present, determining the spectator’s perspective.

Although the materials filmed by the photographers reveal the local reality, Zaides wishes to
discuss a broader, more universal question: what is the potential for violence embedded in each
individual body and what price does the collective pay for controlling the other. Zaides extracts and
appropriates gestures and voices, he engages and identifies with the materials, gradually
embodying them. Questions of participation and responsibility are opened as his body transforms
into a living archive.

Credits
The project is developed through a dialogue between choreographer Arkadi Zaides, video artists
Effi & Amir (Effi Weiss and Amir Borenstein), sound artist Tom Tlalim, light designer Thalie Lurault,
artistic adviser Katerina Bakatsaki, technical manager Pierre-Olivier Boulant and producer Yael
Bechor, Special thanks also to Myriam Van Imschoot.

The project’s concept was developed during Zaides’ studies at the Amsterdam Master of
Choreography program at the Theater School (NL). For this project he has received a prize from
The Emile Zola Chair for Human Rights (IL). Our utmost gratitude to the B’Tselem team for their
important work and contribution to the piece.

Produced by: Arkadi Zaides; Co-Produced by: Festival d’Avignon (FR), CDC Toulouse (FR), Théâtre
National De Chaillot (FR), CNDC Angers (FR); Residencies at: CDC Toulouse (FR), CNDC Angers
(FR), STUK Leuven (BE), Théâtre National De Chaillot, Paris (FR), WP Zimmer, (BE), AHCh Theater
School, Amsterdam (NL); International Distribution: Key Performance

Premiere: Festival d’Avignon, 8 July 2014