Friday March 29th, 2024
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100 Hands

Hailing from the Netherlands, the 100 Hands Dance collective's performances are interactive, intriguing and unforgettable. In Cairo for the D-CAF festival, CairoScene took to the streets with them...

Staff Writer

The 100 Hands dance collective, founded by Dutch duo Jasper Džuki Jelen and Mojra Vogelnik-Škerlj’s bring people together from diverse backgrounds, believing that “flexible structures creates richer artistic work. We’ve created a form of dance which both intimately and intensely allows us to share our vision of a brighter future.” We find this hugely impressive considering we mainly just use our hands for getting the last piece of chipsy out of the bag and/or chronic masturbation.

Working with two local Egyptian dancers for the D-Caf festival, they’re exciting to be performing post-revolution. “We can explore ourselves, not only on stage but now on the streets, it’s a chance for us to give art and contemporary dance to the masses.”

We watched them rehearsing on the streets of Cairo and were intrigued to find that kids wouldn’t just sit and stare, but ask to actually join in.  “The performance is made to be interactive,” says Dzuki Jelen. “ It’s a nice mix between abstract and form, and what these forms cost when you put them in the streets, and what situations occur and how we relate to each other.”

“It’s very important to relate to the public,” adds Morja. “It’s about breaking that barrier that people are used to when watching any sort of performance whilst keeping a balance as to not go too far into their intimate space.”