Event

Salve Regina

SALVE REGINA

Choreography Raisa Punkki
Original music Mark Hertensteiner
Costume design Alice Malia
Performers: Jennifer Meek, Sarah Keeney, Mihyun Lee, Darius Sohei, Meegan Hertensteiner, Raisa Punkki, Pyry Miettinen, Fanni Miettinen
Light design Jack Beuttler

San Francisco-based dance company punkkiCo will present the premiere performance of Salve Regina, an original work celebrating and exploring the human female spirit, at NOHspace in San Francisco from January 8 to 17, 2016. Six different pieces choreographed by punkkiCo director Raisa Punkki and performed by punkkiCo dancers, will comprise the approximately 55-minute-length program.

Salve Regina, a Latin phrase that translates as "Hail to the Queen," is a celebration of the female spirit, body and mind through dance. In this work, choreographer Punkki and her collaborators focus on profound experiences of being female: the strength that lies within the grounded female form, the creating life inside the body, and the power that results when female spirit escapes oppression.

This work attempts to tackle these themes through six original new pieces that present strong and sensual women in different stages of their lives. Dancers range in age from 8 to 47 years, and include an expectant mother in a duet with her soon to be born baby. Each dancer brings the combination of their own strong personality, life experiences, and emotional scars fully to bear in the execution of the grounded, full-bodied and powerfully grotesque movement.

Ultimately these performances center upon the female voice the voice that responds to the title's greeting; a unique voice that can challenge restrictions on how she chooses to be seen or heard; a voice that reflects a deliberately subtle exploration of possibilities in herself; a voice that seeks to raise itself in any number of different ways beyond the body from which it comes.