Kaisa Nieminen & Marika Peura: down below things shudder

down below things shudder

Honey on the rocks, lava in the spine.
Lä-ääh, lä-ääh, uuuh aaah! (or how does one transcribe the ocean?)
Body rolling, body rolling, heavy waves through my muscle tonus.
Eyes low, wavy like the sea, the landscape listens.
Wait, can you feel it?
Another body wave gyrating through me.
I want you to notice it, I made it for you!
My sweat, my lava - a grandiloquent sequence.
Ooops, oh my!
Can you come closer?

The piece fantasizes about the potentiality of dancing; rolling waves, tenacious bodies, the desire to dance overflowingly. Five dancers surrender to the intimacy of dancing; to the experientiality and exchange of energy, engaging in the search of frantic expressions and pleasures of the dancing body.

The name of the piece is a line from poet Rebecca Tamás poem WITCH VOLCANO. (Tamás 2019: 103).

Biographies of the working group

Kaisa Nieminen

Kaisa Nieminen is a dancer-choreographer. Her dance background is in street dance; mainly in hip hop and waacking. This background is reflected in her artistic work and her relationship with the movement. She graduated with a master's degree in choreography from the Inter-University for Dance Berlin (HZT) in 2019. Nieminen is also a member of the rap group Pimeä Hedelmä.

Marika Peura

Marika Peura is a freelance choreographer, dancer and performer based in Helsinki. She works multidisciplinary in the fields of dance and contemporary performing arts. She is interested in the emotional, poetic and political nature that unfolds from the experientiality of the body, and strives for choreography where sensitivity, darkness and humour are in an intimate and uncanny relation. In 2020 Peura graduated from the MA Choreography program at Theatre Academy of the Uniarts Helsinki. She has studied contemporary dance during the years 2014–2017 at Uniarts Helsinki and at HZT's Dance, Context, Choreography programs. Peura’s dance background is in street & club dance culture. This is reflected in her artistic practice and in the relation to bodily movement.

Selma Kauppinen

Selma Kauppinen is a Helsinki-based freelance dancer and performer. She graduated as a dance artist from Tampere Conservatory in 2017, and since then she has worked diversely as a performing artist.

Lau Lukkarila

Lau Lukkarila is a choreographer and performer based in Vienna. Their latest works are NYXXX (2020) at imagetanz/brut Wien and at 8:tension series at ImPulsTanz Vienna International Dance Festival (2021), kneading to the 3rd millennia (2021) brut Wien and When boyfriend material begins to frey (2022) at Vienna Art Week. Currently they are working with Luca Bonamore on Lapse and the Scarlet Sun, which will premiere at ImPulsTanz 2023. Lau is interested in the presence of an ”emotional body” in the act of dancing and performing.

Caroline Suinner

Caroline Suinner is a Helsinki-based multidisciplinary artist. Their career consists of several performative and visual art projects. In their work Suinner has chosen to promote cultural and artistic projects focusing on intersectionality and representation, both on stage, as well as an AD, producer and curator. They learn to accept chaos and imperfection, while trying to create balance in chaotic realities.

Tiikka Drama

Tiikka Drama is a Helsinki based queer sound designer, performer and a music producer. In their work Tiikka is interested in sounds psychofysical aspects and is always looking for new creative ways to move both body and soul.

Luca Sirviö

Luca Sirviö is a Helsinki-based freelance lighting designer, who graduated from the University of the Arts Theatre School in 2019 with a Master's degree in Theatre Art, working mostly in contemporary dance and theatre. They explore performances as total compositions in which the role of light, aesthetic, rhythm and logic are always redefined according to the needs of each piece. Sirviö is interested in the transcendence of categories, the overlapping of genres and the oscillation between the recognisable and the unknown. Sirviö also spends their time in music, another of their favourite genres, as a soloist, guitarist and songwriter in the touring band Teini-Pää.

Virpi Nieminen

Virpi Nieminen is a scenographer and visual artist based in Helsinki. Nieminen graduated with an MA in Design for Performing Arts from The University of the Arts Helsinki in 2021. She has worked in contemporary theatre and dance, immersive and site-specific performances, installation and live art. The relationship between the body and space is at the centre of her work. In the artistic process she wants to get in touch with something unknown, foreign and strange.

Joona Huotari

Joona Huotari, is a costume designer and artist that has worked in a wide range of projects since 2010. His work has reached many audiences through music videos, television, events fashion, theatre, circus and opera. Huotari graduated from Pirkanmaa Vocational College as an artisan in the clothing industry in 2008 and went on to study costume design at Aalto University, School of Arts, Design and Architecture in 2013.

Huotari specializes material processing and has mastered the use of recycled and reused materials. In his designs, he strives to approach costumes in a modern and fresh way. This can be seen on the cohesive production scale and as individual, wearable, works of art. In addition to costume design, Huotari has also worked as a performance artist, graphic designer and scenographer.

Huotari's most recent works include: KOM theatre: ReeaRuu -musical (2022), Opera BOX and Opera Skaala’s Akhnaten (2021), OperaBOX's Turandot (2020), FOX's Kymppitonni (2020), Dance Theatre Hurjaruuth's Winter CircusBAU (2019), Emma Salokoski's Body Positive -teos (2019). Other achievements includedesigning for Krista Siegfrids’ – Marry Me, Finland’s Eurovision Song Contest entry (2013) and the infamous ‘I’ve OnlyJust Begun – the short music film’. Huotari is also a member of the unique art collective, House of Disappointments. Their work was featured in the ‘WEAR(E)ART’ costume exhibition as part of the Kiasma Theater URB Festival in summer of 2020 at the Cultural Center Caisa, Helsinki.

Hanna-Kaisa Tiainen

Hanna-Kaisa Tiainen, dramaturg-director, works with following themes: ecology, relation to more than human creatures, permaculture in artistic process, shared authorship and humour. They mix high with low and I believe in fun and gentleness.

Thank you

Ricardo & Eva-Liisa Orupõld
Venla Helenius
Eva-Liisa Orupõld
Roza Ahmad
Teemu Kyytinen
Tatu Nenonen
Ava Lainema
Jussi Kiiski
Markus Alanen
Outi Markkula
Anni Kaila
Harmony Vornanen
Milla Jarko
Ricardo
Kirsti Nieminen
Tanssiteatteri Hurjaruuth
Zodiak Uuden Tanssin keskus
Liikkeellä marraskuussa-festivaali
Kansallisteatteri
Antti Kivikoski
Valtteri Raekallio
Martta

And all our test audience <3

The sound design has drawn inspiration from the following artists:

Missy Elliott
Little Simz
Death Grips
No Translation
Suzanne Ciani
Wendy Carlos