Party Animals (Nicosia)

Over the past five years, Cypriot choreographer Lia Haraki has created with her company Pelma a comprehensive body of work that moved away from its more formal, movement based origins into new territories of contemporary dance theatre, embracing storytelling and popular culture. All throughout the body of work a distinctive personal signature is shown- a generous love for the human, a preference for the physical as means of expression and a genuine sense of humor and self-relativism.

The central underlying theme of her work seems to be the quest to understand our human identity. A journey which often resembles a balancing act between the comic and the tragic.

Party Animals is the second of a series of new works in which Lia Haraki explores how our personal identity is unconsciously influenced by and built on shared conventional images and references. In Pretendance, a duet with Alexander Michael, they gave a humorous, self-relativising view on their career as professional dancers. In Party Animals they open up their creative dialogue, inviting Ariana Marcoulides as a third performer and the audience to assist at a party. - Guy Cools, April 2007

In the piece the human being is seen as a social animal, using body language to communicate. I am looking at how gesture, movement and vocal sound acquire meaning and symbolic value through human expression and at the same time provide interesting choreographic material

As Desmond Morris mentions on human body language:
‘Our body language...has remained untouched by the advance of civilization. To watch it, is to witness a fascinating human ballet of gestures and expressions, of postures and movements, an every day ballet in which the performers need no training.' - Lia Haraki

Lia Haraki

Lia Haraki (born Limassol, Cyprus) works as a choreographer and performer with her company .pelma.lia haraki. She Studied at the Laban Centre (BA dance theatre) City University in London and continued working as a performer with various companies in Athens for five years. Her work has been presented in European fetivals (Aerowaves Festival London, Tanec Praha Festival, Julidans Aerodance 2004/2005, Kleines Haus Dresden, Euro-scene Leipzig 2004/2005, Kalamata International festival, other) and has won awards (Cyprus Dance platform 2003/2005). She has a close collaboration with dramaturge Guy Cools and visual artist Polys Peslikas. She was the first scholarship recipient from Cyprus for the Dance Web Programme of the Impuls Tanz Festival in Vienna in 2003. In 2005 she initiated the creation of Dance House Lemesos, for which she is the president of the board and a founding member, representing Cyprus in the European networks Dance Web-Europe and Aerowaves. Lia is teaching technique and choreography at the University of Nicosia in the BA Dance course. In 2007 she has been voted by the public as ‘creator of the year' in the Madame Figaro Awards.

Alexander Michael

Alexander Michael began his formal training at the School of Toronto Dance Theatre, where he studied. While in Toronto, he had an opportunity to perform with some of the leading choreographers in the area, including David Earl, Tricia Beatty, Danny Grossman, and Newton Moraes. In 1997, he moved to New York on a full Coca Cola scholarship to the distinguished Martha Graham School of Contemporary Dance. He was the principal of the Graham Ensemble, and has performed with Pascal Rioult, Megatron, and Maher Benham. An injury led him away from the dance world and towards a successful international modeling career. Upon returning to Cyprus, Alexander began dancing again. He had a fruitful collaboration with Lia Haraki appearing in many of her productions, as well as Alexandra Waierstall, Christodoulos Panayiotou, Chorotheatro Omada Pente, Karolina Constantinou and others. His choreographic career began with "Piazzolla Meditteraneo," a series of duets performed with live music. This led to a collaboration with Jeunesses Musicales, under which he has shown his work. He soon followed with his first entry at the 2005 Contemporary Dance Platform and has been a permanent part of the Cypriot dance scene in the past four years as a dancer and choreographer.

Ariana Markoulides

Ariana graduated from Salzburg Experimental Academy of Dance in 2004 with a degree in Dance Performance. She returned to Cyprus in August 2004 and up to August 2007 took part in a number of performances in Cyprus and abroad with local dance companies such as .pelma.lia haraki, Solipsism, Interact, Chorotheatro Omada Pente, Diastasi, and a production with the Cyprus State Theatre. She was assistant choreographer to Antonio Collandrea in December 2006 for the dance company DanceCyprus. During this period she attended workshops with Chris Harring, Lin Snelling and Guy Cools, Machi Lindhal, Kurt Koegel.

Ariana is currently in the second year of studies for a Masters in Contemporary Dance Education in Frankfurt am Main. In March 2009 she participated for the first time as a creator of the piece, "Fellow People" with Katja Mustonen, in the Cyprus Dance Platform.

Polys Peslikas

Polys Peslikas (born 1973) is a visual artist who works with painting and photography. Since 1996 he presents his work in Cyprus and abroad. He is part of the creative team of the magazine Isterografo (Fileleftheros). He has also collaborated with various Cypriot choreographers as an art director.

The event is part of the Kypria International Festival 2009.