Konstgruppen Ful

Baba Karam – through Jamileh and Khordadian

Two people moving with arms out in front of a screen with four people in bright colored costumes dancing

Photo: Nemo Stocklassa Hinders

Fr 18.2.2022, 20:00-21:00, MDT

Sa 19.2.2022, 20:00-21:00, MDT

The latest work from the Art Group Ful is a participatory dance performance based on the popular Iranian dance form baba karam.

Three performers and a DJ invite you to dance and listen to memories of dance, in a room inspired by queer clubs and separatist parties where everyone gets to dance for and with one another. The dancers and DJ will not be performing IRL, but will interact and ask you to dance in the space that all of us, despite the distance, will be sharing. The physical absence of performers is not merely a way of making the performance safe and possible to tour during the pandemic. It also offers an artistic opportunity to create and explore the specific conditions confronting us in times of pandemic. 

The work is also a tribute to the two influential and well-known American-Iranian choreographers Jamileh and Mohammad Khordadian, who have encouraged millions of people all over the world to dance. Their important work has expanded the boundaries for what dance can do and mean to people. For many, they have also been influential in framing a dance created in diaspora.

"Baba Karam – through Jamileh and Khordadian" is a piece that poses questions about intimacy, mobility and our need to create spaces for being together that bridge physical distances. This is a consequence of the pandemic but also an obvious reality for people living in the diaspora, as refugees, and in an era of climate change.

Sepideh Khodarahmi is a dancer, actor, cake sitter and dragking. They are educated at the Theater Academy in Gothenburg and Amsterdam Hogeschool voor de kunsten. Sepideh Khodarahmi will host the show IRL at MDT and dance together with the audiences.

Konstgruppen Ful

The queer feminist art group Ful performs, exhibits, creates publications, and curates talks and meetings through an intersectional understanding of the art event. Ful has worked in Sweden and internationally since 2008 with, among other things, the art magazine Ful and acclaimed and award-winning performances such as Europa Europa and Mödrars Manifest. The project Baba Karam is closely associated with Ful’s new dance initiative Finding Sisterhood which is a decolonizing and queer survey of contemporary dance and performance.

Nasim Aghili (b. 1980) is a Swedish-Iranian artist, director, writer and performer. Nasim works in the field of performing and visual arts and their participatory performances, theatre installations and art in the public space often deal with the experience of existing and living in different forms of exile and take the form of healing rituals. Nasim Aghili’s plays have been translated to different languages such as English, Spanish and Arabic and their work has been performed or presented in countries such as Puerto Rico, England, Mexico, US, Holland, Estonia and Sápmi.

Malin Holgersson (b. 1974) is an artist, dramaturge, podcaster and editor that works mostly within performing arts and audio drama. Their work is interdisciplinary and combines text, sound, voice and body/ies. With a background as a cultural journalist and radio producer, they often use journalistic methods and stage documentary stories.

Rani Nair dancer and choreographer, whose works have been programmed at the Centre National de la Dance Paris, ImpulsTanz Vienna, Spielart festival Munich, Ignite! Festival of contemporary dance Delhi, Singapore International Festival of Arts. Represented at the Performing arts museum, Dance museum in Stockholm and in the book Oxford Dictionary of Dance and Re-enactment.

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Concept and idea

Direction and script

Choreography

together with the ensemble

Interviews and editing of dance memories

Jafar the Superstar’s monologue

Set design

Costume

together with the ensemble

Assistant director

Makeup designer

Sound video

Light video

2nd assistant camera

Baba Karam– through Jamileh and Khordadian is produced by Ful in collaboration with the Gothenburg Dance and Theatre Festival/Stora Teatern, MDT – Stockholm, and Rani Nair Production, with the support of the EU network Be SpectACTive, the Swedish Arts Council, the Swedish Arts Grants Committee, the City of Stockholm, Region Skåne, the City of Lund and Maxi grant from Stenkrossen.

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