WOHNZIMMER
A dancepiece by Ilona Pászthy for two dancers

Wohnzimmer was nominated for the Cologne Dance Price 2000 and gained the 2nd prize and the prize of the public at the Competition for Choreography of
Contemporary Dance in Belgium 200

The piece
Someone builds his world, his harmony, his “that’s it” and everything fits. Someone else runs, searches and doesn’t find what he is looking for. What happens when
this one breaks through the oasis of the other one? He demands, oppresses,
wants to take part , wants to end the harmony ? What happens at the end of such a meeting?
Maybe another version of “that´s it”, maybe a “how is it”, maybe “it´s not, because it is
always different”? This piece is about situations of tension as well as about the meeting of extreme contrasts: harmony and disharmony, wish and reality, yearning and fights about strength and control. The living-room as the symbol of safety and inner peace must be left to be built up new. Contrasts, absurd moments and paths in the inside and outside space are themes for Ilona Pászthy`s idea of finding movement. Directed improvisations and elements of contemporary dance and release-technique determine her choreography.
“Columbus would have been surprised about all the possibilities of what is possible with
an egg….first the high as a man egg is taken apart to reveal a minimalistic living-room.
Sociability doesn`t grow up here but this place becomes kind of an arena for arguments about power……dancing-wise Ilona Pászthy circles around one of the main subjects of our time: the problem of human nearness. With remarkable terseness Pászthy translates the ups and dowsn of attraction and repulsion into pure body language…. “
Basil Nikitakis, Kölner Stadtanzeiger, 29.8.2000

“The dance as well as the intelligently constructed stage elements of the sculptor MiegL
are full of variations: with admirable velocity the two dancers give impulses to each other.
Sometimes very gently, sometimes defiantly they push and guide each other into new positions, intertwine limbs and build sculptures with their bodies as rich in ideas as
the sculptures made of the white pieces of the egg. So the premiere of Ilona Pászthys
“The Living-room” was a peak at the festival “summer special 2000”.
Nicole Strecker, Kölnische Rundschau, 29.8.2000