Author: Emese Kovács.
From 17 to 20 March 2025, Bunker Ljubljana hosted the Beyond School event, a meeting of dance universities from the region, as part of the Beyond Front@ – Bridging Periphery project. The goal of the event was to facilitate knowledge exchange and foster a network of students and teachers across Central Europe, linking the region’s dance communities. The main venue of the program was Stara mestna elektrarna, an old industrial building in the centre of the Slovenian capital, which serves as a venue for independent performances − I spent three and a half rewarding spring days here as a critic.
Beyond School – Ljubljana, Slovenia – 19 March 2025. Photo by Nada Žgank
On Monday afternoon, on my way from the station to my hotel, I stopped in front of the building and was delighted to find that it was only a 5-minute walk from my accommodation. It was my first time in Ljubljana, and as famous as the saying is that everything is within walking distance in this city, it was reassuring. Later in the evening, I returned to the building, where people were already gathering. I also met up with dancers from the Central European Dance Theatre, whose Four Seasons performance was part of the program. I glanced around, a little perplexed by the groups of people, but aside from them, I didn’t spot any familiar faces. I had a strange feeling among the chatting dancers, dance students and dance teachers: in this situation, I was not one of them, and I felt like an outsider. Would it be better to hide the purpose of my coming for now, as perhaps then they will speak to me differently? Or should I go on a hunt for another kindred spirit — a fellow writer or critic? I regularly struggle with the tension between my dancing self and my critical self, the two different roles. I caught snippets of Croatian, Polish, and Slovenian conversations as I explored the industrial elements of the old power station on display, with little explanatory descriptions. The industrial building impressed me with its scale and strange details. Luckily, a solo performance by DISCOllektiv soon gave us the chance to explore it — an unofficial but fitting start to the days ahead, helping me to settle.
DISCOllektiv’s performance was part of the series of events called Context, which is a side program displaying or contextualising different angles of the author’s work that is currently showing a premiere at Elektrarna. In this case, Gregor Kamnikar became our tour guide. First he invited us into a small side room (which later served as our dining room), where long pieces of paper hung from the ceiling, with names, locations, and inspirational ideas that had been part of the company’s work so far. Throughout, Gregor played with the question of identity, and added that we would see seven Time Dances if we followed him in the so-called Event Museum, where we, the time and the space, would shape his performances. His personable tone and direct presence quickly eased my initial anxiety — partly because I had just arrived, barely knew anyone, and I’m not always thrilled about being an active spectator. Gregor managed to create an intimate, communal feeling among us, and this comfortable homeliness only grew as time went on. As he kept us talking, alternating between Slovenian and English, he did little improvisational dances in the different spaces of Elektrárna and between us.
With his etude Life Reframed, Greg played with re-enactment and the impact of the current environment on performance, and then we also visited the backstage where he told the story of his knee injury. With this personal touch, I felt thoroughly engaged (if only because of my own old knee ligament tear) and nodded enthusiastically that yes, I know what it’s like to be on the B-side. The last couple of the Time Dances took place in the spacious theatre hall, where the auditorium was covered in crumpled piles of white paper. Here, we listened to the soothing melodies of his velvety, deep voice and ukulele, and then he sent us upstairs among the papers. It was then that I found myself wading through performance photos, notes and flyers with my Martens — a moment of uneasy guilt, like stomping through someone’s artistic oeuvre.
Tuesday arrived, when after lunch together — full credit to the event’s cooking team, who prepared delicious meals with care for all allergies and dietary needs — we visited the local Secondary Preschool Education, Grammar School and Performing Arts Grammar School Ljubljana. Our large group of people took a bus (well, well, not all of Ljubljana is within walking distance). After an adventurous cramped community experience on the bus, we arrived at a beautiful, spacious school. Here, the senior students of the Contemporary Dance Department performed their exam based on Edvard Kocbek‘s text Fear and Courage. Somewhere here, I decided to write a personal report rather than a critical review of the performances, as they are students who are still at the beginning of their professional careers.
Beyond School – Ljubljana, Slovenia – 19 March 2025. Photo by Nada Žgank
The performance started with a simple, yet eerily effective scene: a soloist girl came in, started laughing, and was joined in her laughter by the other students who gradually walked in. We laughed along with them, but there was something heartbreaking about this forced merriment. Like when the clown in the circus keeps falling, but the audience laughs at his misfortune. The dancing students first explored the theme of fear, starting with strange poses illuminated by flashlights, and shaky images, and then the atmosphere became more and more joyful. In the second half of the performance, we really arrived at the circus, a variety show with swings, clowns, acrobatic moves and pantomime. One girl in a ballet costume pirouetted, others waltzed, some danced hip-hop solos, others twirled ribbons or juggled. Everyone showed what they were strongest and most confident at. Despite the showcase nature, there was still a slightly absurd, slightly disturbing atmosphere that permeated the whole performance. The Slovenian students are undoubtedly colourful individuals, with different physiques and technical skills, but they all carried through the beautifully arched composition by Nina Fajdiga and Nataša Živković with pure presence and enthusiasm.
Later in the evening, we went to see the Central European Dance Theatre’s Four Seasons, choreographed by Maciej Kuźmiński, for the second time − actually, for the third time in my case, counting the rehearsal! I wrote more about it in my review, now I will just point out that sitting closer to the dancers again, I was more engaged, touched by the details, the presence of the performers, the endless flow of the choreography, the cleverly edited, drawing-in hypnotism. Particularly meaningful was the post-performance audience talk led by Jaka Bombač, where not only the dance students but also the audience members stayed. Naturally, the audience was made up mostly of people from within the profession — including, as I later realised, some well-known local choreographers — but what unfolded was a genuine dialogue rich with deep reflections. Starting from the illustrative nature of the performance we saw, to the quest for perfection in modern dance, to the theme of nature as discourse, to the importance of pauses and the shifting relationship between man and nature, to environmentalism, countless profound ideas emerged in just over an hour. All this was also thanks to Jaka, who invited the audience into the dialogue with his opening thoughts, inspiring them to express themselves freely, yet sophisticatedly. Already on Tuesday evening, the small tables of the schools were set up with brochures, leaflets and video presentations of the courses on offer at the university. At the Polish table, the dancers studying there took the floor, and I was happy to mingle with them. This is how I learned, among other things, that they were also studying acting, and quite a bit of it, which foreshadowed why they were so strong performers on stage the next day. But let’s not get completely ahead of ourselves.
What if… by Hungarian Dance University– Ljubljana, Slovenia – 19 March 2025. Photo by Nada Žgank
On Wednesday evening, we returned to the brick-lined, unplastered walls of Elektrárna: it was time for the debut of the dance academies. Three short choreographic etudes were prepared, each with different strengths, as was evidently the training of the students. The Hungarian Dance University‘s presentation, What if…, was committed to being no more than a choreographic etude showcasing the diverse qualities of the students, resulting from the collaboration between them and their masters Gabriella Kézér and Virág Sóthy. It was good to see that the Hungarian University of Dance was represented by five students from the Commercial dance specialisation of the Dancer and Coach Department, as it is usually the Dance Artist Department students who get these kinds of opportunities. The students (including one boy, the same proportion as the other two groups) seem to be receiving a broad range of training and are also confident performers. Some performed acrobatic hip-hop solos, others attracted attention with robotic isolated movements, and one girl was clearly more drawn to modern and contemporary trends. The latter was Panna Pozsonyi, who stood out for her experimental approach, her unique movement culture and her beautiful use of her hands. With her raised shoulders, and her sometimes grotesque but also polished movements, she was not afraid to be “ugly”, or “different”, deviating from the usual aesthetic, “perfect” outward showing. The etudes were organically interwoven with small transitions, so that, even if What if… had no dramaturgy or a specific theme, it seemed a unified, coherent work, with moments set to pop music, dramatic or even romantic violin scores, and with a spirited, authentic performance.
Smoke (chor. Eryk Makohon) – Ljubljana, Slovenia – 19 March 2025. Photo by Nada Žgank
The second act of the evening featured the Polish students from Akademia Sztuk Teatralnych from Krakow. They brought a very different choreography, creating characters and atmosphere from the very beginning. The performance Smoke built a strong world of its own, not only with the black, sexy and at the same time masculine, tough costumes, the tango or chanson music, the props, the thoughtful lighting, and the smoke machine but also with the presence of the performers. They all brought to the stage slightly phlegmatic, confident, passionate individuals who at first struggle to light a cigarette, and then eventually all light and smoke them. Their world is smoky, dark, burning, flaming, smothered and then erupting like lava, almost exploding the stage. Interestingly, the Polish dancers were stronger not only in presence, but also physically, yet they effortlessly threw each other up, spun energetically to the ground and then rose up again. Perhaps this power sometimes overflowed in the sound of the landings, the bounces. The final sequence with the burning cigarettes in their mouths and then the smoke enveloping them is definitely an image that will stay with me for a long time. Dr Eryk Makohon did a skilful job with the Polish students.
Close (chor. Charlie Brittain) – Ljubljana, Slovenia – 19 March 2025. Photo by Nada Žgank
The third performance of the evening was again a complete contrast to the others, and not only in the fact that unlike the previous two, we were not seeing seniors but first-year academics of Academy of Dramatic Art of the University of Zagreb. The nine students seemed young — and still a bit raw, both in their performance and technique — but the merit of their performance was something else entirely: poetics. Close had a soul; it breathed and touched me in a very different way from Smoke: it didn’t want to devastate me, it wanted to caress me. If Smoke is fire and explosion, Close is water and breath. Full of silences, pauses, attention to small gestures, and lyrical images that fill the whole stage. The soundscape, impressive in itself, was made up of dripping rain and musical fragments that leapt out of it. A particularly memorable scene for me was the image of the dancers lying in a line, with the only boy in front soloing, trying the impossible, sometimes moaning or snorting into it, and a girl at the end of the line just sitting and watching him. Then the pair try to connect in a duet, but they slip apart, collide, limbs flailing, gently groping each other, searching for the other. Subtle touches, holding each other, lowering to the ground, pushing off, simple gestures that tell all the more. Close was a clever composition with skilful choreography and space games, conscious editing, poetry and air, which is mainly thanks to Charlie Brittain as the lead choreographer (but the students also took part in the creation). The strongest elements of the performance are where the dancers are not completely “confined” to fixed movement sequences and partnered choreography, but where their own movement qualities and explorations are asserted.
Close (chor. Charlie Brittain) – Ljubljana, Slovenia – 19 March 2025. Photo by Nada Žgank
It was unfortunate that local dance students didn’t come to see this high-quality and diverse evening, as they could have been inspired as to where to go to further study. Though, the brochures and institutional representatives were waiting at their stands on Wednesday evening too, welcoming anyone curious to dive in more. (In addition, as I learned, there is not much serious university dance training in Slovenia, so it would have been especially useful for them to learn about their options in the surrounding countries.)
As the pressure of the performances began to ease, the students were ready to unwind a little. So, part of the group — myself included — wandered down to Zorica bar, tucked away in the basement of the student hostel, where, not for the first time over these three days, the question of how to become a dance critic came up. Well, this is much harder to answer, especially given my own identity struggles, than what it takes to become a dancer — which seems clearer: quality training and dedicated teachers, like those I encountered at Beyond School. The only shortcoming I felt in the program was the lack of opportunities for casual encounters, introductions, or ice-breakers, which made it a bit harder for someone like me, who barely knew anyone, to melt into the group and find my little community. Luckily, one or two more open-minded students took it upon themselves to do so, and they came, asking questions and engaging in conversation even with the odd ones like these critics. So in the end, maybe that’s part of the answer too: stay curious, keep the conversation going, and participate. Well, there might not be a single answer — but this certainly feels like the right direction.
This text was written by Emese Kovács within the framework of the Beyond Front@: Bridging Periphery project.
