Roberta Legros Štěpánková & Matthieu Legros: Labyrinth of Emptiness

Zuzana: Where are you now, where are you two in the process of creation, in which moment, where I’m meeting you now?

Roberta: I have the feeling we are in the phase before the finalisation of the piece, but there are still questions and possibilities to add something – editing out, maybe also skipping or erasure of something. And in the process… Our premiere was planned to be in June but it was postponed, and in August we will have a general, and it is not finished yet. Even if a lot of things are clearer now, it is still in the process.

Zuzana: If you can talk a bit more about the problem or topic or subject you are now researching?

Roberta: The subject of the research is a search. I’m always interested in somehow searching through my experience – and to do it not only by reflection, but to do it physically, researching through the physical material. I have been, for a couple of years, interested in space – in the inner space and the outer space. This fascination with space was also at the beginning of this piece. It manifested as a fascination for the empty space. What is it? Can we call it empty? Are we allowed to call it empty? This is something we know from meditation or from Eastern approaches – and maybe some part of the inspiration was coming from there, from some literature and some practises. But also emptiness is something inherent to space – or the notion of the infinite. Sometimes the empty is substituted for the infinite – infinite space. Maybe it was more intuitive, but very early in the process there was a notion of the labyrinth. And I remember that sometimes in the beginning of the process I wrote down: Maybe the empty space is an infinite labyrinth. And then I wanted to have a look at the labyrinth and research it a bit more. I started to search for the construction of the labyrinth, the stories about the labyrinth – but also not too much that I would call myself a specialist in it. It is still more intuitive work.

Zuzana: How were you proceeding? If you call an empty space a labyrinth, what kind of practises, what kind of tools did you use? How did this notion of the labyrinth as an empty space lead you into the process of working on the movement and sound material?

Roberta: Now when you say it, the empty space in the labyrinth is almost an oxymoron – or almost a paradox. Because when we imagine a labyrinth, it is full of roads which are leading you somewhere.

Zuzana: And a labyrinth is also about decision-making. It is about what kind of path you are choosing, and how you orientate in the labyrinth – in the emptiness. If you call a labyrinth empty space, what kind of path were you choosing in the process of work?

Roberta: Now when we talk about it – now in this moment – I feel it is almost an opposite, or an encounter of opposites… As you say, in the labyrinth you make many choices – it is a constant tension: where do I go, am I right, am I wrong. Meanwhile, in the empty space, you don’t have to worry so much about it.

Matthieu: But for me, the labyrinth is a way to meet the empty space.

Zuzana: Because there is something about navigation – how you actually choose to make decisions, or what you follow, how you orientate, or how you navigate in this empty space. Because if you say in the beginning that you orientate in the emptiness, whereas in the emptiness you feel like you don’t have to be pressed by something you must choose – are you then using intuition, or what kind of tools help you to navigate through it, if you consider it to be hollow or empty?

Roberta: There are two lines – what decisions do we make in the piece, or what decisions we were choosing during the process of creation. And there I feel that I always somehow… I read something or I look at something, and if it resonates, then I know I’ll use it in the piece. And there I use intuition, because I don’t make the choices through rational processes. And when I started to look at the labyrinth and there were these different characters, I was suddenly attracted to some of them, because they spoke to me. Even before I was curious about the labyrinth, I was reading a book which spoke about two voices in the body – one voice which is more of the thinking mind, and the other one more in the body-mind – very deep, intuitive, almost like primitive energy. And I had this strong experience when I could hear these two voices in the body. It was in one workshop, where I had time to work on my own. And these are the pieces of experience that are coming together – and I don’t really know why, but I deeply trust that they’re the right inspirations for the piece. It is very much intuitive work.

Zuzana: Speaking about these characters, could you maybe name them, or say why they resonated with you so much?

Roberta: So, for example, talking about these two voices, which I experienced very strongly – like the front and the back of the body, almost two personalities being one being.

Zuzana: Almost like having one head with two faces.

Roberta: Yes, Janus – the god with two faces. He is the representation of the unity of two opposites. He is also the god of the gates or the doorways – that’s the passage where two opposites come together. Related to this I felt very strongly the character of Ariadne – how she is romantic, dreamy, even naïve, in love. And it relates with the frontal body which is very soft – also in physiology, this frontal part is more tensile, more elastic – and the back part is related to something more bound, more round, which is related to the character of the Minotaur – which represents the past, what we don’t see.

Matthieu: With these three characters – Ariadne related to the sky, Minotaur related to the underground – and the third one is Daidalos, the architect, the constructor. He has the ground under control.

Zuzana: How are these three in relation?

Roberta: They don’t come to a confrontation – this is something for further development of the piece. But how they are now is, for this moment, enough.

Zuzana: If we speak about the two-faced god and Ariadne, how do you work with this in space – meaning movement material, how do you translate or embody these characters? Or what are the tools you are using? How do these characters speak to you? You are both working with sound or voice – and voice is a kind of resonance of the empty space. How do these characters resonate in the emptiness?

Roberta: There are different entries for me – how to embody the character. One, which you mentioned, is sound and text-making. Sometimes, one day it is sound and text through which I enter, and that informs the dancing body. Because to leave the quality in one modality can inform the dancing body.

Matthieu: Yesterday you were saying the contrary.

Roberta: Yeah, definitely – it works also the other way around. It is actually very natural for a human being – how these two modalities are interconnected. And it was great to have time to research on it. I started to rehearse and the voice came naturally to complete the character – another layer of it. I allow myself to be in a very intimate relationship with the character. I allow myself to have time, to be carried by the character, to let it live from the inside.

Zuzana: And I see you are speaking about time, about temporalities you are using – that you kind of leave the space. How do you orientate in the emptiness, or for some decision-making, do you also take time together with the audience?

Roberta: Yes, I think to work on the empty space… Now we can be more categorical and we can divide it – to work on the character and to work on the empty space. But in reality, they merge together. And taking time is very important during the whole process – knowing the necessary time for the beginning, for the ending, for silence or stillness. And I feel there are still a lot of opportunities in it – in dance and in music also.

Zuzana: Maybe speaking about you two. Because you also said that Ariadne is in love with… How are you two in love with what you are doing? How do you two work? Because you were speaking about the body followed by the voice – and what is Matthieu doing, and how do you relate to it?

Roberta: In a very simple way – we meet together and we say, “Let’s work,” and we start working. And I think it is Matthieu’s influence in this. When I start, I would like to speak, analyse…

Zuzana: So you are taking the Daidalos position 🙂

Matthieu: I’m totally instinctive.

Roberta: I’m efficient. And always when we improvise, I want to name things and write them down.

Zuzana: Is your work a mutual listening?

Roberta: Yes, very much – and indeed more and more. We can talk about characters, emptiness, about the space – but today I felt that we can let go of the structure, so we can come back to the listening.

Matthieu: That was super important these days, because I was busy with the technique and I was not able to observe so much what came now in the process.

Zuzana: So you think you found a certain way how to orientate in that labyrinth of emptiness?

Roberta: Yes and no – to make it not so easy. I think we found a great way to collaborate – that’s the really important basis. And I mean, I wouldn’t say that it’s finished, but I feel that it is very alive material and we can work it more and more… but also I feel to have a pause.

Thank you.