With a background in Bharata Natyam, Sara Mikolai develops experimental work. In her contribution for the Julius-Hans-Spiegel-Zentrum, she investigates the gaze in colonial photography and plays with the tension of visibility and invisibility as well as knowledge and ignorance, starting with a photograph of devadasi dancers from Kasten Nr. 942n Exotischer Tanz. She dives into the prehistory of Bharata Natyam, a south Indian dance that was developed out of the devadasi tradition after the abolishment of the British colonialists in the wake of the Indian nationalist movement.

Concept, Performance Sara Mikolai Costume Nadine Bakota Sound Performance Tara Transitory

The JULIUS-HANS-SPIEGEL-ZENTRUM is a special guest of the Tanztage Berlin. As a mobile research space, the Julius-Hans-Spiegel-Zentrum examines the interweaving of different dance cultures since the modern period. This center, along with its archives, has been a guest of the Sophiensæle since November and is departing Berlin with a thematic weekend bash on january 29th till 31st. Beginning with the archive box 942n, a historical collection of dance photographs, various artists in residence have been creating new pieces since November. The pieces by Florentina Holzinger/Vincent Riebeek and Nelisiwe Xaba were created during the Spiegel-Zentrums sojourn in Freiburg and will be presented in Berlin for the first time.

DURATION about 30 mins each ARTISTIC DIRECTION Anna Wagner, Eike Wittrock ARCHIVE SPACE umschichten SCIENTIFIC COLLABORATION  Tessa Jahn MANAGEMENT Katharina Fenderl ASSISTANCE Dominik Zippe

Produced by Julius-Hans-Spiegel-Zentrum GbR, in cooperation with the Internationalen Forschungskolleg Verflechtungen von Theaterkulturen, the Lipperheidesche Kostümbibliothek, the Staatliche Museen zu Berlin and SOPHIENSÆLE. Funded by the Hauptstadtkulturfonds. With friendly support of Akt-Zent e.V..