Paula Guzzanti

dance artist and scholar
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Malta, United Kingdom (residence), Argentina, Spain, United Kingdom (citizenship) °1981
research interests: improvisation, affect, performance-making, dance, Choreographic Research, improvisation practice
affiliation: University of Malta
en

I am a dance artist, and scholar based in Northern Ireland and Malta. I trained in contemporary dance, and improvisation in South America, Europe and the UK. I have an academic background in International Relations and Peace and Conflict Transformation studies. I acompleted a practice-as research PhD in Dance at Queen’s University Belfast. The focus of my research was on the relationship between conscious awareness and affect in dance improvisation practice and performance. I am interested in artistic collaborations as a way of creating intentional affective spaces for performance-making. My performance projects involve designing stimulating live performance situations, using sound, voice, and sculpting visual spaces to inhabit through dance improvisation.

research

research expositions

  • The Emergence of Choreographic Material in 'Silent Pact' (2018) (2019) author(s): Paula Guzzanti published in: Research Catalogue
    About This exposition presents the documentation of the choreographic material of my performance piece 'Silent Pact' (2018). This work is a collaboration with voice artist Una Lee. This Exposition Includes: 1) Visual Essay (10 mins) 2) Photographic Documentation (2 images) 3) My mother's original letter (English version) 4) My mother's poem entitled 'Silent Pact' (English version) 5) Soundtrack version of the screen dance. 6) Essay 'On the Emergence of Choreographic Material in Silent Pact' (forthcoming publication in the Journal Corpografias) 7) GIFs of Choreographic Material Becoming (5 gifs) 8) Screendance 'Silent Pact' (2018) Background to the work The performance evolves from re-visiting an intimate affective trace –a letter from my mother– through dance improvisation and performance-making practice. In June 2015, I received a letter from my mother together with a poem entitled Silent Pact (28/06/1981-28/09/1981). The letter tells the story of my mother having to keep me in secret, as she got pregnant three months before her church wedding. I discover that my real birthday is three months earlier than what I had been celebrating all my life. In 2018, I am commissioned to create a piece as part of the International Women’s Day celebrations in Belfast; the theme was women’s silent voices. After considering various stories of women’s that were close to me, I remember my mother’s letter. This is what choreographer-dancer Silvy Panet-Raymond pointed to me as a ‘radical practice’ . Although I don’t consider myself exploring radical ways of creating performance, it was interesting for me to note that in this work the movement vocabulary contrasts dramatically with the movement in a series of pieces that share the same research focus – the affects of dance improvisation. In Silent Pact, there is a clear moving away from stylish vocabulary, I achieve a strong presence in a performance charged with emotional nuances and textures. I chose this work for discussing the emergence of choreographic material as I found that the resulting choreographic material emerged from a particular set of conditions that was a move towards defining my artistic signature.
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