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From August 6 to 10 anoukvandijk dc presented the final series of DESEO performances during the festival De Parade in Amsterdam. The performance was in Amsterdam, like in the other cities, a big success and was on all occassions performed for a sold out audience, with exception of the rainy days. Above a photo- and video account of the first performance in Amsterdam, or better the green side of the first performance.

Last Saturday was the last days of the TSEKH Summer School in Moscow. While around Moscow whole forrests were burning and the temperature and the smog level reached record heights, Anouk van Dijk was daily teaching 2 hours of technique class and 2 hours of repertory/composition workshop. The required level to participate in Anouk van Dijk's classes and workshop turned out to be much higher than many of the participants had seemed to think. Despite this, the enthusiasm with which they participated was high and almost everyone was able to gain some valuable insights. The video above displays a short excerpt of the last Countertechnique class and a full recording of the end presentation of the workshop.

In Moscow, Anouk van Dijk has by now been teaching a half week during the TSEKH Summer School. Our relation with TSEKH dates from 2001, when our company performed at their very first festival. In the past few years we've kept on collaborating with them. The Summer School is one of the very few opportunities for Russian (aspiring) dancers to learn about modern dance. Unfortunately the circumstances are this year far from ideal. The weather is with 38-40 Celsius hotter than ever measured before. And the studio's have no airco. In their third week the students are therefore quite exhausted. Also the level is this year rather varied. In earlier editions the majority of the students were advanced professionals. This year the group is largely made up from beginning professionals and advanced amateurs. Despite the week of teaching and preparing dancer / teacher Birgit Gunzl did, the class and workshop material had therefore to be adapted substantially. But it's still special to be in Moscow and make a contribution to the development of dance here!

From Avignon to Moscow, with one night in between in Amsterdam. Beforehand it all sounded very exciting but it turned out to be mainly very tiring. A lot of dragging around suitcases, doing laundry and sleeping only a few hours. We arrived home at 17.30 hrs and left again 7.30 hrs the next morning. The flight to Moscow didn't have any delay fortunately and at the airport we saw, on her way back to Amsterdam, our dancer / teacher Birgit Gunzl, who had been teaching last week the first half of the Countertechnique intensive at the TSEKH Summer School in Moscow. She experienced the classes and workshops very positively, despite the greatly varying level of the students and the overwhelming heat in the city. Like in Avignon, temperatures rise every day above 35 degrees Celsius, but where Avignon was cooled down by the Mistral wind from sea, in Moscow there is no wind whatsoever while the city is permanently covered in a thick layer of smog. The people on the street all seem to be exhausted due to these circumstance, because the heat has keeping the city hostage for for quite some weeks now and an airconditioner is a luxury only very few Moscovites can afford. The energy that you usually find in the city is therefore now also completely absent; most people seem to have fled the city, we concluded from the fact that on our way from the airport we hardly encountered any of the endless traffic jams that usually pester the city. The remaining people in the city are the workers, the many homeless and drunk. A bigger contrast between the bristling festive Avignon and the pooped, overheated Moscow is difficult to imagine. In the evening, while in the metro on our way to TSEKH Aktovy Zal for a show by Dance Theater Iguan by choreographer Nina Gasteva, a 20 minute deluge brought a brief relief from the heat.

Saturday evening we premiered TRUST at the Festival d'Avignon. The show - with almost 800 seats - had been sold out for weeks and at the box office there was a long cue of people hoping to get a last minute ticket. The atmosphere in the 'theater' (the huge court of the historical building of the Lycee Saint-Joseph) was great, despite the cold Mistral that suddenly during the day had started blowing. The show was received very enthusiastically by the audience and after the show, that ended at midnight, a party at the garden of the Palais du Pape had been organised. The first review had the headline "Magistral theater of cruelty" and referred to the great poëtic and political character of Van Dijk's choreography. A memorable debute of Anouk van Dijk in France!

Yesterday was the press day at Avignon. First in the morning at the Cloître Saint Louis an interview where Anouk van Dijk and Falk Richter were explaining about their collaboration process in making the performance TRUST. Then in the evening, before the nightly rehearsals, a photoshoot for a big collective of press photographers. On the video the morning interview as well as some scenes from TRUST for the fotoshoot.

Yesterday Anouk van Dijk, dancers Nina Wollny, Jack Gallagher and Peter Cseri and managing director Jerry Remkes travelled to Avignon, where the performance TRUST will be performed this week. See the video above.