Film to Dance and Dance to Film

Lene Boel, choreographer, dancer and dance film director. Trained at several of the leading schools in London, New York and Holland – among them, the London Contemporary Dance School, the Merce Cunningham Studio, the Susan Klein School, the Trisha Brown Company, and the European Dance Development Center. Founded Next Zone in 1997 after dancing with, among others, Bill T. Jones in New York and La Compagnie I.D.A./ Mark Tompkins in Paris.

Artistic Profile
Human instinct, the senses, emotions and the skeleton are the basic elements in Boel’s special vocabulary of movement. Her choreographic language ranges from delicate gesture to violent physicality. In addition to her choreography for Next Zone and her own solo work, she is one of the only Danish choreographers to make dance films. 
Since 2000, Boel has worked with films as an outside source of inspiration for her work. To date, she has tried her hand at such different genres as silent film, science fiction, animated film and the films of Japanese director Akira Kurosawa.
The works do not only reflect the distinctly different languages the bodies speak in the films, but also their interplay with each other and their surroundings.  The plot is peeled away and the characters remain, drawn with a distinctive bodily language.
Taking a starting point in filmic universes provides the choreography with a recognizability that opens up the understanding of dance.  At the same time, her interpretations equip the audience with new interpretive keys to films.
Since 2001, Boel has collaborated closely with composer Rex Casswell and light designer Jesper Kongshaug, creating a core production team for Next Zone. She also works with scenographers, musicians, and film artists and has achieved much recognition for her ability to create aesthetically beautiful and integrated performances in which light, sound, staging and dance merge into a higher unity.

Current Productions

CINEMATIC MOVES – A series inspired by film

Cinematic Moves # 1 - Kurosawa Twist
(2004)
A solo inspired by the human instincts, strong physical expression, and the distinctive figures in the films of the Japanese director. It is an audacious fusion of solo dance, music and light.  Taking its starting point in such films as Seven Samurai, Ikiru and Yojimbo, the performance moves between the extremes of the violent and the delicate, the cold-blooded and the comic.

Cinematic Moves # 2 - Artificial Body
(2004)
Inspired by science fiction films such as Terminator, Solaris and Mars Attacks, Boel creates a world inhabited by cyborgs, robots, Martians and other aliens, all shown as creatures with body language twisted to extremes. It is a brutal, mind-boggling and unique journey into the artificially created body.

Cinematic Moves # 3 – Cartoons
(Premiere in the fall of 2006)
Cartoons from the US, Japan and Europe are the source of inspiration. The dancers are characters with a humorous body language and a vital energy. They experience funny situations and violent events in the fantasy world of cartoons.

THE KINOKICK SOLOS
A series of four short solos inspired by silent films. May be performed
separately or in the same evening as a 60 minute performance.

# 1 - Silent Clown, 2000. Inspired by Expressionist films.
# 2 - Astronaut Priest, 2001. Inspired by Surrealist film
# 3 – Asta, 2002. Inspired by the Danish silent film actress Asta Nielsen
# 4 – Vagabond, 2006. Inspired by Charlie Chaplin’s films

DANCE FILM

Zoisk
(1999)
A site-specific dance film, shot in various locations around Iceland.
A ‘space fable’ about the creature Zoisk, who awakes after a long hibernation and whirls out into a wonderful journey through wild landscapes and underground tunnels on the moon Io.

Review Extracts

“Boel abandons herself to this game of immobile masks, expressing fear,
hilarity and sensuality... impressions from the outside become
expressions from within...It is exquisite, sensitive, and funny at the
same time.”
Les Saisons de La Danse (FR), KinoKick solos

“A dancing homage to Kurosawa… The dancer becomes a marionette between the intelligent soundtrack... and the powerfully expressive lighting, costumes, and Boel’s trademark propeller-hair ... The performance is a visual poem … there is no cohesive story but a series of short portraits – alternately, comic, touching and exact.”
Politiken (DK), Cinematic Moves # 1

“The choreographic language in the hour-long performance is original,
inventive, taut and the idea is absorbing all the way through.”
Jyllands-Posten (DK), Cinematic Moves # 2

“The robot’s body is extremely material, and it gives Boel and her three dancers an opportunity to explore completely different conflicts from those of the human body, which is so full of passion.  Some of the most touching choreographic moments in the performance are the exhausting duets that are not about a loving encounter but an existential struggle...”
Politiken (DK) Artificial Body, Cinematic Moves # 2

International Tours

2007
July: Festival Fabbrica Europa, Firenze/Italy (Cinematic Moves # 3-Cartoons)
May: Cinedans, Amsterdam/The Netherlands (Lifeforce)
Invitations to Rahmallah Contemporary Dance Festival, Palestine & Beirut
Invitations to Masdanza, Canary Islands/Spain

2006
Monaco Dance Forum: Presentation of the installation Lifeforce.
14 Quinzena De Danca de Almada: Contemporary dance festival, Presentation of the solo Vagabond.
Production of 3 new dance films Lifeforce # 1,Lifeforce # 2 and Lifeforce # 3 in Reykjavik/ Iceland with support from Nordscen and Nordic Culture Foundation.
P@art Showcase Copenhagen/Denmark

2005
Site-specific choreography (Reykjavik /Iceland)
Festival Masdanza (Las Palmas de Gran Canaria/ES)

Lene Boel’s work has been presented in France, Germany, Norway, Hungary,
the US, Portugal, Greece, Spain, Monaco, and Iceland at events and festivals
such as the Festival de la Nouvelle Danse Uzès, the Monaco Dance Forum, Junge Hunde, and the Coda festival.