Free Gestures - Wolne Gesty (book)

Free Gestures is a choreographic exhibition by Ula Sickle, activated by a group of dancers for five hours each day from March 2 to 25, 2018 at the Center For Contemporary Art, Ujazdowski Castle. It is an encounter between choreography, literature, and the format of an exhibition. The starting point is the question of how ideologies become incorporated into our bodies and language. Here, it is not the performers’ bodies or objects that are the works of art, but rather performed texts, gestures, and movement.

Not a catalogue in the classic sense, the publication collects literary texts performed by dancers (In Love With the Movement of the World by Jacob Wren, Seen and Heard in China by Mi You, Save All by Natalia Fiedorczuk-Cieślak, Nothing Left Undone by Anna Zett and Punjab by Amandeep Sandhu) and theoretical essays (Sample by Daniel Blanga Gubbay, Everyday Catastrophe of Gestures by Agnieszka Sosnowska, “Manic depression is searching my soul.” On Neoliberalism’s Dominant Structure of Feeling by Rudi Laermans).

The book was created in parallel with the exhibition and in a subjective way shows work to which the viewer usually has no access—weeks of rehearsals with performers or changes in the gallery space. The visual material consists of photos taken by the artist while working on the project.