Nederlands Dans Theater 2 NL
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“Nederlands Dans Theater is the best dance company currently dancing on this planet”, said about the Dutch company Nederlands Dans Theater Mário Radačovský, the former head of the Ballet Company of the Slovak National Theatre, who has cooperated with NDT in the past. The company has been shaped by world famous choreographers Benjamin Harkarvy, Jiri Kylian, Sol León, and Paul Lightfoot. After five years, chosen young dancers of Nederlands Dans Theater are returning to Pohoda as a headliner of non-music programme.
Nederlands Dans Theatre 2 was created in the late seventies as an NDT platform for the most talented young dancers from around the world aged 17-23. This company opens the way for pioneers of dance and door for bold artistic initiatives. As the New York Times wrote about the NDT 2 choreography: “The relationship between music and dance is a dreamy, it is rather additional than substantive. Dancers on stage live their own lives and intentions”. Several Czech and Slovak choreographers and dancers appeared in Nederlands Dans Theater: Jiri Kylian, the long-time head of the company, Mário Radačovský, the former head of the Ballet Company of the Slovak National Theatre, Lukáš Timulák, and Natalia Horečná , the author of Slovak dance choreography. Timulák wrote about the dance company: “NDT is an attraction for anyone who is looking for creativity in dance”.
Pohoda visitors will see two performances of NDT 2 (at noon and late in the evening): Cacti, and a brand new ballet Feelings. Cacti performance by the Swedish choreographer Alexander Ekman brings together sixteen dancers on the stage with four musicians of a string quartet playing music by Joseph Haydn, Ludwig van Beethoven, and Franz Schubert. Cacti was nominated for the prestigious dance award Zwaan for the most impressive production. The new NDT II performance "Feelings" from the Israeli team of authors Sharon Eyal and Gai Behar premiered on the 18th February. It is founded on carnality that is rising to the ritual, hypnotic, and very impressive shapes. The first reviews particularly highlight the excellent soloist Alice Godfrey, who performs fragile, sudden movements in a fight with the “army of nine dancers”.
The LA Times wrote: “These dancers they can slip from one motion extreme to another with a complete ease”. The NDT dancers work on the stage with the floor, breath, and all sorts of sounds. Sometimes they even use the help of viewers (as we could see it at Pohoda 2011). Still, the main essence of their art is that they perform challenging choreography, themes, and ideas with a great joy of dance, which infects every audience.