Ahmed Ben Abid, Christophe Al Haber, Dana Amer, Emran Alamareen, Hadir Nached, Moayed El Ghazouani, Momen Nabil

The project “Un|Controlled Gestures” has been taking place at HAU Hebbel am Ufer since 2019. The fourth edition brings together new works by seven choreographers from Egypt, Jordan, Lebanon, Syria and Tunisia. Following residencies in Cairo, Dresden and Berlin, HAU is offering insights into their performances in the creative process for the first time.

The focus is on the theme of trembling:
the artists search for a dance vocabulary around trembling and shaking – as a physical expression of political, social and personal experiences.The works developed draw on layers of personal and collective memory. They open up individual artistic explorations and at the same time explore sources of strength, vulnerability, poetry and resistance. In a performative process, these forces are taken up, shifted and radically transformed.

“Un|Controlled Gestures” sees itself as a platform for choreographic works in contemporary dance that deal with body politics and poetics as well as intimate and collective memories – memories that go beyond the known and documented.

The jury for the seven selected projects for this edition consisted of Nedjma Hadj Benchelabi, Ghada El-Sherbiny, Petra Poelzl and Samaa Wakim.
In addition, on 19 and 21 April, HAU will present works by Samaa Wakim and Islam Elarabi, who developed the still touring works “Losing It” and “Just One Tile” as part of “UnControlled Gestures”.