Jozef Frucek & Linda Kapetanea
Fighting Monkey: Delving deeper into the memory of our mythological bodies

Fighting Monkey: Delving deeper into the memory of our mythological bodies How to rediscover our forgotten mental and physical potential During the last year at ImPulsTanz we worked with wood and axes (‘playing with the dragon’s pearl’). This year our partner will be 3 tons of soft clay. We will work it and shape it in an effort to harness its natural qualities of mobility, adaptability and softness, as survival tools for our physical practice, and in the search for the memory of our mythical body. We will continue to explore and question the aesthetic and practical values that have long been considered in movement education as 'certain' and 'beyond' discussion. Fighting Monkey could be described as form of practical philosophy, a way to animate and explore a range of ideas in a practical setting, giving a physical, empirical dimension to concepts and theoretical study. It is a form of emptying and listening designed to cultivate and stimulate body in the midst of the world, using difficulty and danger to develop strength, adaptability and test what is possible. Clay is a material that will help us to access and harness the wasteland of our subconscious to reconnect us to a more primal state, the intuitive/primitive body, to allow us to reveal fundamental mythological images, reaching far beyond individual experience, but entering collective memories. Be functionally open, to meet more effectively and adaptively the forces, which are acting on us so we can rediscover our forgotten physical and mental possibilities and move towards a mythological existence where imagination bends time and space and alters our perceptions of what we think we can do. Maximum number of participants: 30. RootlessRoot was founded in 2006 by Linda Kapetanea and Jozef Frucek as a vehicle for their own productions, research and teaching. Since 2006 Kapetanea and Frucek have been developing the Fighting Monkey research program, an ongoing, evolving framework of ideas for training/working that have developed during the past years they have spent traveling and working the world over. Based in Athens, a city of iron and concrete, they are building their language of physical expression that is chaotic, raw, and remains in opposition to what surrounds them both culturally and politically. Their approach is born out of their belief that the body can still express our innermost desires, feelings and visions, and that time of heroes is not gone. Linda Kapetanea is a founding member of RootlessRoot. Kapetanea graduated from the State School of Dance in Athens, Greece, winning a State scholarship to continue her studies in New York, where she was collaborating with the choreographer Irene Hultman. As performer Linda has worked internationally with various dance companies including Horeftes and Sine Qua Non in Greece. From 2002-2006 she worked with Wim Vandekeybus’ Ultima Vez, creating and performing stage productions of Blush, Sonic Boom and Pure, as well as in the film productions of Blush and Here After. Since 2006 she is staff teacher in State School of Dance in Athens. Jozef Frucek is a founding member of RootlessRoot. He graduated from the Academy of Music and Theater of Bratislava, completing his PhD Thesis in 2002. During 2002-2005 Frucek was a member of Wim Vandekeybus’ Ultima Vez, creating Blush (stage and film versions) and Sonic Boom. During 2005-2006 he collaborated with the Royal Flemish Theater in Brussels (KVS) on his own work. From 2006 - 2011 Frucek was on the teaching faculty at the Athens State School for Dance. Since 2012 Frucek is member of the teaching personnel of the University Ludwik Solski State Drama School of Krakow in Poland.