Losing It (2021)
Can you still hear the bombs? I can hear them. Growing up in a war zone means living and breathing politics. The Palestinian choreographer and performer Samaa Wakim asks herself how these experiences impact her identity in a new solo performance - Losing it - which explores how the trauma of previous generations manifests in her own body through movement and sound. In a journey towards the moment she began to fear for her freedom, the piece dives into her memories of growing up under occupation, exploring the various realities she lives in, and the fantasies she’s created out of fear and hope in order to survive. As fear overtakes her, her world begins to disintegrate: the floor becomes unstable, and the sounds begin to warp, creating a world where reality and fantasy blur. Created in conversation with the score played live by Samar Haddad King and accompanied by Wakim’s vocals, the sounds that once caused fear and the sounds that once provided solace become woven together to the point where past and present cloud the future. ARTISTIC TEAM Co-creators: Samaa Wakim & Samar Haddad King Performed by: Samaa Wakim Music by: Samar Haddad King Song: Turathy Album- Autostrad Prayer by: Mounira Wakim Light Designer: Cord Haldun Technical Director: Moody Kablawi
Sawtik (2022)
Your silence will not protect you The piece about five dancers from Morocco, Mali and Palestine focuses on the voices of young people looking for new ways of togetherness Choreography: Taoufiq Izeddiou Set and costumes: Loriana Casagrande Music: Taoufiq Izeddiou, Mathieu Gaborit Dramaturgy: Nedjma Hadj Benchelabi, Sara Dirks With: Fouad Nafili, Bibata Ibrahim Maiga, Hassan Oumzili, Samaa Wakeem, Abdel Mounim Elallami
Modern Curses (2018)
A man and a woman were transformed in an odd way. A monster known as gravity is pulling them down. Iron gods transfigured them, and they now resemble a huge infinite machine that is working non-stop. They try to live moments of freedom outside this giant crushing machine. Where will they find their redemption? By surrendering? By destroying this machine? And how can they destroy it while it was constructed from their own bodies? Is destroying their own bodies their last way of liberation? What a curse! The creators of the work are presenting the body as a political object. They raise questions through a system of movement, poetry and philosophy regarding the right of the oppressed body, within an authoritarian regime, to destroy itself for the sake of liberty. A Piece by Bashar Murkus and Samaa Wakim Director: Bashar Murkus Choreography: Samaa Wakim In cooperation with Fadi Zmorrod Scenography: Majdala Khoury Music by: Faraj Suleiman Performers: Samaa Wakim and Fadi Zmorrod Show and Stage Manager: Samera Kadry Lyrics: From Genesis - Old Testament Translation: Katharine Halls Vocal: Abu Gabi Percussions: Naghib Shanbehzadeh Light design: Moody Kablawi Public relations: Mustafa Kablawi Graphic designer: Nihad Awidat Photographer: Wael Abu Jabal Production of Khashabi Theatre 2018
Against A Hard Surface (2016)
Against a Hard Surface, an evening-length dance theatre piece, asks what happens to a group of people isolated from the rest of the world by a wall. Created by theatre director Amir Nizar Zuabi and choreographer Samar Haddad King with an original score by Muqata’a, Against a Hard Surface examines how a population survives a high-pressure ecosystem of unremitting political strain, violence, and containment. The work is a relentless portrayal of human resistance and resilience in a dystopian landscape. Against a Hard Surface is a production of Yaa Samar! Dance Theatre and supported by the A.M Qattan Foundation/ The Qattan Grant for Performing Arts 2016 and Covillo Lynch Foundation, and co-produced by Sareyyet Ramallah in partnership with the Palestinian Museum.
Bound (2014)
bound is an evening length multi-media production created in collaboration with an international cast. Situated between mobile planes that act as buildings, boundaries, and projection surfaces, the performers confront an evolving landscape of borders that continuously test their physical and emotional limits. Layered over and between the live action, the story of two lovers separated by circumstance unfolds via Skype. Conceived and directed by Samar Haddad King with an original score by muqata’a, this performance tells the universal story of people restricted by society, politics, geography, or gender, and examines what it means to be bound: to a place, a person, an ideology, to noise, to silence.
Badke (2012)
Badke is a distortion of dabke, the Palestinian folk dance. The performance starts out from the popular variant: the people’s social, festive dabke. Ten performers go on to confront this locally rooted dance with elements from worldwide pop danceculture. So Badke becomes a double quest: one that conveys the unique Palestinian desire to ‘belong somewhere’, and at the same time the wish to be part of a world beyond that. Since 2006, les ballets C de la B, KVS and the A.M. Qattan Foundation are working on a series of workshops with young Palestinian performing artists. Last summer dramaturge Hildegard De Vuyst and choreographers Koen Augustijnen and Rosalba Torres Guerrero went to the Occupied Territories to create the dance production Badke. Together with a group of young Palestinians, young autodidacts from various disciplines,the trio explored the possible relations between folkloristic and contemporary dance. COLOFON c o n c e p t & c r e a t i o n Koen Augustijnen, Rosalba Torres Guerrero, Hildegard De Vuyst c r e a t e d a n d p e r f o r m e d b y Abdallah (Abud) Damra, Ashtar Muallem, Ayman Safiah, Ameer Sabra, Hiba Harhash, Maria Dally, Samaa Wakeem, Mohammed Samahneh, Samer Samahneh, Maali Maali a l s o c r e a t e d w i t h Ata Khattab, Fadi Zmorrod, Salma Attaya, Yazan Iweidat, Farah Saleh a s s i s t a n t d i r e c t o r Zina Zarour s o u n d t r a c k Naser Al-Faris, edited by Sam Serruys c o s t u m e s Britt Angé, Nicole Petit l i g h t i n g d e s i g n Ralf Nonn s o u n d h a n d l i n g Steven Lorie / Donald Berlanger p r o d u c t i o n KVS, les ballets C de la B, A.M. Qattan Foundation c o p r o d u c t i o n Zürcher Theater spektakel, les Théâtres de la ville de Luxembourg