«Un populu diventa poviru e servu quannu ci arrobbunu a lingua addutata di patri | A people becomes poor and enslaved when their language handed down by their fathers is stolen from them.».
Ignazio Buttitta
Petranura Danza is the company that won the last edition of the Danz’è choreographic competition and for this reason presents a show co-produced by the Festival. Ma-shalai is a choreographic project that roots itself in the study of the gestural language that has always characterized the expressive modes of the Sicilian people. Looking at the collections of Giuseppe Pitrè—the most important folklorist and scholar of popular traditions of the island, to whom we owe a sort of “vocabulary of gesture”—Petranura Danza aims to restore the charm of this “language of figures.” Sifting through the tangled words of the Sicilian dialect, it has discovered ma-shalai, a term that indicates a moment of intense enjoyment, of intense pleasure, albeit sometimes ephemeral or illusory; and has saved it in an ampoule ready to be contaminated by other languages. A new tangle of disarticulated gestures that have survived a technological disaster: from here we set off to reach a new kinesthesia, which is nothing but the cyclical repetition of something that has already been and transforms into a future rich in roots. In Ma-shalai, the aim is to highlight how, despite the many contradictions that animate and often penalize Sicily, a sweet and wild poetic passion lingers in the air.
Salvatore Romania was born in Catania. He has danced in various theaters (in addition to the Bellini and Stabile in Catania, at the Théatre de la Ville in Paris, at the Lublin Dance Theatre, and the National Theatre Mohammed V in Rabat) and in numerous international festivals and rassegne (Torinodanza Festival, Tanec Praha Festival, Mittelfest, Schouwburg Arnhem, Fonderia / National Dance Foundation). From 2000 to 2003, he collaborated as a soloist with the Astra Roma Ballet company of Diana Ferrara, and since 2005 he has collaborated with the Zappalà Danza company. In ’97, he co-founded A.C. Megakles Ballet with Laura Odierna, now a Ministry-recognized company under Mibac, within which Petranura Danza was born. With Laura Odierna, with whom he has shared numerous national and international awards for choreography, he is currently working on the production of the works Infinitamente piccolo (homage to Primo Levi) and L’ombra del minotauro.
Laura Odierna was born in Catania. She trained in Rome with G. Bodnarciuc, in Switzerland with R. Horta and I. Wolfe, and in New York at the Alvin Ailey Dance Center. In ’97, she co-founded A.C. Megakles Ballet with Salvatore Romania, now a Ministry-recognized company under Mibac, within which Petranura Danza was born. She has danced in numerous productions such as L’isola, L’albero di limoni, Ceusa, Gesture, guests at national and international festivals and rassegne, such as the Marathon at the Venice Biennale, Tsyoing Theatre in Taiwan, Festival Alandri in Athens, Taormina Arte, Torinodanza Festival, and the Teatro Stabile in Catania. With Salvatore Romania, with whom she has shared numerous national and international awards for choreography, she is currently working on the production of the works Infinitamente piccolo (homage to Primo Levi) and L’ombra del minotauro.
