Sharon Eyal: I don’t believe in talking so much. I really believe in physicality, because also my life is like that you know, I’m not separate my life from my art. It’s my therapy. It’s my life. It’s my food.

Alistair Spalding: So welcome to this edition of Choreographer Conversations. I’m delighted that we have Sharon Eyal, choreographer.

Sharon: Thank you Alistair.

Alistair: I just always wanted to start at the beginning when I ask people about their dance experience. So, I mean, what were you like
as a little girl? That’s my first.

Sharon: I was very, very hyperactive, like crazy hyperactive. I never slept, I never ate. It was very hard for my parents. And then they found dance for me, Maybe I found it, but they found it. And I was four years and I become much better like, I start to sleep, start to be better, and I didn’t stop since then. It’s my therapy, it’s my life, it’s my food.

Alistair: So I hear this a lot. A lot of hyperactive children when they really are just wanting to express themselves physically, they find it difficult to do otherwise and as soon as they find that physical language, everything changes.

Sharon: Yeah, I think the physicality, it’s mental. For me, physicality and emotional it’s connected. And I think the moment that I found,
I found this physicality, I found the mental and the emotion organise together. It just has to be like that, you know for me there is no other way. If people ask me why you do it, I say, because I cannot not do it you know, it’s something that, this is my life.

Alistair: And when you’d said you started, you found some dance to do what kind of dance was it?

Sharon: So you know, when you are four, it’s not like classical, modern or something so they took me to improvisation classes and I loved it, and then I started to do ballet and I was really a ballerina, and I knew that I would be a ballerina. And then I was very young, I was 16 and a half something like that and somebody, I was in a school and somebody proposed me to come to Batsheva. And I was there a long time, and I always did choreography because also when I danced, I did choreography.

Alistair: Yeah, okay.

Sharon: And actually when I was 13, I did my first piece

Alistair: When you were 13?

Sharon: Yes, I paint all of me red and not my face, just the body and my pointe shoes, and I broke my pointe shoes and I had Béla Bartók
music, that I love. And it was really like neo classic feeling and yeah, and since then it’s always

Alistair: Is there a video of that piece when you were 13? That would be nice to see.

Sharon: No, I wish

Alistair: It sounds like, you already, as well as the, performance you’re always thinking about the costume and the look of things, at that young age.

Sharon: Yeah. I was always into aesthetic. I was always, taking stuff and break it and change it and adapt it and do it different, and it was always my thing. You know, I love clothes and I love shoes the most. And I like to do, like, different stuff and it’s not that I’m preparing so much. It’s very authentic. It’s like, again, I don’t know how to do different a bit also in this sense.

Alistair: And so you said that you, trained as a ballerina really but as you moved into the contemporary world did it change your style, or do you still see yourself?

Sharon: I always feel like I’m a ballerina. Always. All my life. Doesn’t matter what. I was always there, you know, and also for me what I’m doing now, I’m not calling it contemporary. Not at all.

Alistair: What would you call it?

Sharon: I’m not calling it. And also for me, if I will peel off everything, it will be very classical, actually.

Alistair: Yes. Yeah. So there’s a root there that’s… I remember William Forsythe just gave a lecture, for the Kyoto prize

Sharon: That I love very much.

Alistair: And he said this thing, that “you don’t learn ballet you become ballet.” And I think it’s true.

Sharon: It’s so true. And also what you’re saying now, a lot of time, I’m talking to the dancers and I’m telling them, be the element. Don’t try to be. Just be the element. So I think it’s quite the same feeling of being, not trying.

Alistair: So you then started your own company, and you, you made this company with, your partner and your

Sharon: Love.

Alistair: Yes, and your love, yes Gai Beha, and I want to ask you actually just how that works, because your equal Artistic Directors, if you like, of the company, what is that like?

Sharon: First of all, I think without Gai, my husband and my favourite person, I will never do this company because he was the one that, not pushed me but saw it before me. And so he was the one. And it’s working amazing because he’s amazing container and I’m very problematic. So the combination quite good. I just need to take care sometimes.

Alistair: Yes, so he, he kind of takes care of the practical and the…

Sharon: Yeah, he’s the most, for me he’s my manager, for me.

Alistair: But it’s more than the manager isn’t it?

Sharon: He’s the one that taking care.

Alistair: And also he came from a kind of music and club background. And is that how you met, is it through that?

Sharon: We met in museum, but…

Alistair: In a museum?

Sharon: Yeah, but, also he did a lot of parties and I came and danced there so, and it was amazing parties, like really techno and really good ones. The best quality.

Alistair: So this then feeds into your work as Love. It was called Love at that time was.

Sharon: Now it’s OCD

Alistair: But the, this idea that there’s a combination of this ballet if you like, we’ll call it ballet shall we? And the rest, the sound world is really one of the club, more or less.

Sharon: You know, I never thought it’s club. I also thought it’s hardcore, but it’s not, for me it’s not club. It’s about, about momentum and about energy and about timing. Because it’s also very primitive. It’s also something that, you know, people dance always. So club, it’s one thing but it’s not music of club, it’s music of the heart. It’s music that I love because I love classical music and I love techno music, and I love Spanish music and I love so many, and rap. It has to be good and it’s has to touch me. So it’s not so much about club, but when we met each other, we felt like the work that I’m doing connects to everybody. Yeah. So from there it came, you know, the idea of doing something like that because it’s for everybody.

Alistair: Yeah. And people feel involved somehow.

Sharon: People feel like a part of something and not far from something they can feel free, they can move, they can go out, in, they can see it, not see it. And the part of it, and for me the really part of the choreography.

Alistair: Yeah. So I first saw your work in, Montpellier Festival on a piece called House.

Sharon: You saw this one? Okay

Alistair: In 2013, yes that’s right yes that’s right that’s when I first, came across the company, and then we at Sadler’s Wells we then, first, really, collaboration was through the Love trilogy. Well, it started, actually, as OCD Love.

Sharon: Yes. It’s true.

Alistair: I don’t know if it was always going to be a trilogy or whether you just went from one to the other.

Sharon: I think it’s always continuation. It’s I don’t know if trilogy or something, but it’s also continuation because for me it’s life, you know, and I have deadlines. So I will bring what it is. But it’s always part of something that was there or will be in the future. So, it’s, it’s like a bread that you cut, you know, but it’s the same bread.

Alistair: Yes, I say that to people when they ask me about your work. I say, well how is next one? I say, well, it feels like that. It feels like you’re a painter who’s just painting the next painting, it’s the next, it’s a continuation of an artistic life.

Sharon: Because also my life is like that, you know, I’m not separate my life from my art. You know, I’m working with my family. I’m dreaming with my family and I’m part of, this is my life, you know, so I cannot separate it’s not like projects, it’s all life. And I just want to say that about R.O.S.E that we waited a long time to do it, Gai and me, until we found this amazing person, Ceous, and we felt now we have somebody that we can do it. You know, the real skill, the honesty, the best ever, really like the best musician, best crew, total feeling. So I feel like it’s important to say that it’s always collaboration.

Alistair: No totally yes, well let’s talk about R.O.S.E now I was going to talk about it later, but, you.

Sharon: No, you can talk about something else.

Alistair: Oh no it’s fine, It’s okay. We’ll talk about it because, it sort of refers back to what we were talking about just now this sense, it’s the ultimate engagement through that music and I always felt it during watching the performances is that you take us on this journey and there are ups and downs, like you get in the club, so that you get that journey, and it’s the ultimate one, isn’t it? Where there is really, you are really in a club.

Sharon: You are really in a club, and you’re free and I think because it’s free, the dance have to be even more intense and sharp. I always telling the dancers, you know, because we’re in a club and it’s like admittedly you can be like free, but then you have to be the opposite. The details have to be more, the quality, the sincerity, because it’s it cannot work if it will be like easy going it has to be the best quality ever and then it can work in this environment.

Alistair: Is that because it’s so close? It’s so close up?

Sharon: I think because of the feeling and the vibe of it and also the close, but it’s not just the close, it is the feeling of people like, people can be what they are, you know? And I don’t want to feel the dancer suddenly becoming, you know, clubbing because it’s not about that.

Alistair: Yeah. And how did the dancers cope with this? Because they, as you say they have to perform in quite an extreme way, but also they have to crowd manage they have to be moving through, have some confidence to keep going.

Sharon: So because it’s new project it’s taking time to realise what they need. For example, there is no phone out, they’re not getting this on the face. We know that sometimes part of our team just helping them with the people and also, I have to say, they’re amazing dancers and people. And they’re doing it, it’s almost like they have the magic and people move, you know, they are so good, with this elegant feeling and very subtle it’s happening, but, but also, I build stuff to help you know, like composition that, you can move, the dancers’ moving.

Alistair: Oh, yes. I mean, I have to say you have created this structure which really works you know, it’s not just, you know, you’re choreographing this situation in the club incredibly well and cleverly as well.

Sharon: Thank you.

Alistair: Yeah, because it’s because the movement is also of the of the audience.

Sharon: It’s all about them.

Alistair: And by the end of this evening, we are all dancing, basically. And, that’s such a great thing.

Sharon: Because it’s for everybody, you know, it’s, you don’t need to look at it from far and it’s part of you, you know? You don’t need to be a dancer to dance and feel free.

Alistair: So that’s where we are now and just to go back a little bit to the beginnings of Love. So you made this trilogy, OCD now. It was a trilogy on love and I wanted to talk to you about that work because I was just reading a little bit about how you described it on your website, each one has a very specific sort of, description of what love is, and it’s not always a positive thing. So it’s as we all know, love is beautiful and positive, but sometimes it can be very hard and was this what you were trying to explore in those three pieces?

Sharon: I’m not trying to explore. I’m just feeling, you know, it’s all about feelings, if you will just open it it will be part of feelings. You know, love it’s everything, love it’s life, it’s not bad or good, it’s everything. So I’m not trying to go to the stories because the stories already exist. For me, it’s like the movement, it exists. You know, I always say like imagine you have something in the space and you just go into it. So for me, the same, it’s in the emotion. It was there. I just want to project it in this way, you know? So it’s all how you wrap it and bring it to the place or to the people. It’s a presentation and and the package.

Alistair: Yes. And it does, you know, there are certain movements, which I won’t try and do, but.

Sharon: Try to do. Please.

Alistair: But they were, something like this. It’s, this sort of thing which is, often in your, vocabulary

Sharon: It’s true. And a lot in the neck.

Alistair: And it’s, and I guess. And I and I guess, you know, it’s why dance exists, because only that expresses so much about that emotion.

Sharon: You know, that I was in Gothenburg and I create a piece it’s called Saba. And it was with Charlie, my son, and we went in the street and we saw poster, and then he says, okay, if people will, and he was very young he said, like, if people will ask me what my mother do, I will do like this. And I was like, okay, Charlie, I think you can say more. But he also chose this, you know?

Alistair: Yes. Interesting.

Sharon: But there is more, details and more like, elements and there is so many.

Alistair: Yeah. Yeah. And, just while we’re talking about the movement language and it’s also that there’s a kind of, what would you call it?Non-gendered, you know, the dancers are not male or female. They are something else.

Sharon: Yeah. They are something else.

Alistair: Can you just say something about that? Why?

Sharon: They are men and women, but, I feel like it’s becoming a very unique movement. It’s almost changing. It’s almost mutation. I feel like they’re becoming, like a mutation of themselves so I’m not thinking about the men and women. I’m thinking about the people, you know. And also in life. I’m not thinking about it so much I’m more connected to people and I think something in the movement quality it’s very feminine, but in the same time it’s very technical it’s very elegant, but it’s also wild. It’s always the combination of men and women, actually, and maybe women and men, you know? And for me, it’s always I need the fragility as much as you can be strong, if you’re not fragile, it’s would never work for me.

Alistair: Yes. Yes, I can see that.

Sharon: And it’s not working. If it’s not the combination, it’s not working.

Alistair: So how does it work? Do you do auditions? How do you come across dancers?

Sharon: A lot of dancers have worked in companies and also there is dancers that are already 13 years with me, and nine years and
and we did audition also.

Alistair: But you say you meet some in companies that you work with.

Sharon: They meet me. I’m not asking dancer for company. They come to me. But we did audition also.

Alistair: Yeah. And the qualities you’re looking for, you know, so in terms of technique, you’re looking for ballet training?

Sharon: You know, some of our dancers are ballet trained, but some of them not. I’m not looking for this technique I’m looking for total feeling. I love precision. I love clearness, but I need, I wanted the dancers to be in the best technique, but they will also be like the first born
baby, you know? So it’s without, any mannerism or extra. It’s have to be clean with this knowledge so the combination, it’s extremely hard, it’s you find it, but it’s hard. You cannot hide, you know, because the movement and, the emotion are so open that you cannot hide.

Alistair: And how, what class do you do every day?

Sharon: We’re doing our classes with inspiration from a lot of things. And we do also a bit of ballet. I really love Gaga so we’re really inspired from it and we also do.

Alistair: And could you explain Gaga?

Sharon: Yeah, but I want to tell you. We do Gaga, we do Pilates, it’s combination of a lot of things. And Gaga for me it’s more like, it’s more me, you know? Because I feel like it gives the space for each one to be who they are.So I took it for my way.

Alistair: Yes. It’s a style that everybody can do isn’t it, Gaga? It’s a very open thing.

Sharon: You have to experience that. It’s not like, yeah.

Alistair: So those are the three, there were in many, many.

Sharon: No, there is a lot. And also when we do class we do ballet in the middle, not ballet but exercise, a lot of exercise, a lot of, walking on the leg. It’s preparation for the piece because it’s really hard and it’s very demanding.

Alistair: Yes, because they’re up there the whole time, aren’t they?

Sharon: All the time and they told me, the dancers that the all of them have bigger feet now they have a number more.

Alistair: Do they?

Sharon: Yes. Because all the time, the information, it’s open the toes and it’s always there. So now it’s one everybody.

Alistair: They will have one extra. So they have to get new shoes. And I guess they have to get used to that. That’s something.

Sharon: Yeah. It’s taking time.

Alistair: Yes. Yeah. That’s quite remarkable. So just to move on so the other thing you do is you get involved in other worlds and you’ve worked in fashion. You’ve worked on fashion shows, for example, and you worked here in London with Bold Tendencies in the car park. Yes. Which is remarkable as well. And also you just worked in the Palais De Tokyo. So, how is that different? All these different kind of places and the way you have to be. Say you’re in a fashion shoot.

Sharon: I think it’s, it’s different, but it’s also the same because I bring something for me and my qualities there. I love to do it because it’s open and it’s inspiration for me. I love fashion and I love to work in Palais De Tokyo and I love Bold Tendencies. It’s really like a place
that give me new inspiration, because space really makes something different, an in the end of the day, I’m coming and doing what I know to do, so it’s not so different. But, it is different, you know, you coming with different preparation, different space, different audience.

Alistair: But I guess also in a fashion show, there’s a little bit more pressure because, there’s lots of people, the clothes are there everything has to kind of work in a machine, like a fashion machine.

Sharon: Yeah, but I get a lot of freedom also there to do it right.

Alistair: Yeah. Yeah, yeah. They have money. Yes. Exactly. Yes. Yeah. And I guess that’s helped you along the way as well, because it’s a way of getting. Yeah. And you’re now living in, in France.

Sharon: Yes. Outside of Paris.

Alistair: And that’s a very, good place to be, isn’t it?

Sharon: Amazing. It’s like a dream. I’m not there a lot, but it’s really like a dream.

Alistair: Yes, because they give you good support and yeah.

Sharon: Good support. I feel very seen. I love to be there, I feel a lot respect to what we’re doing and it’s.

Alistair: Yeah, good. So the other thing you do is you work a lot in other companies around the world, which again is a different sort of context. But you do that a lot, don’t you? A lot of companies have your work and I wonder how that works? Sometimes you’re making new work in those situations. Sometimes it’s existing. But yeah. Tell me about the new, how you cope with particularly the ballet companies we all know and everyone talks about it that you get very little time. Because they’re doing rehearsals for other things and you know, so how do you prepare in those situations, particularly if it’s new piece.

Sharon: I’m working like I’m working with my company, but it’s different skill because most of the time the companies are bigger. And honestly, I love to do things with mass. I love composition, and I love, to play with it. So, it’s different, but it’s also, again, the same approach, you know, I’m not coming different. I’m coming me. We just did now a production with NDT. And we did the piece Into the Hairy that I love so much. And we did it with 28 dancers. And it was really amazing. It was like all the pieces. It was like sculptures. It’s broken and trying to go back. And I always imagine Into the Hairy with a big company. It was my in my head always. So when I came there, for example, I knew everything. All the sculpture was there, all the compositions.

Alistair: But that’s a piece which existed, so where you have to create and the dancers…

Sharon: Same.I’m, you know, your approach to people it’s you know, I’m not looking at them “dance company ballet”. I’m looking at people and I’m working with what they have and there is amazing dancers in the world.

Alistair: And so, you know, then you mentioned Into the Hairy which is the next thing at Sadler’s Wells. But then you have another new piece I think, premiering in this autumn, which we’re in now. Tell us a little bit about it what’s it called, by the way?

Sharon: It’s called Delay the Sadness.

Alistair: Delay the Sadness. Is there anything you can tell me about that title?

Sharon: This piece is a bit, I can talk about it, but, I also don’t want to talk about it so much. But, this piece is for my mother that passed a year and a half ago, and I loved her a lot.

Alistair: Yeah. I’m sorry.

Sharon: And it’s really about my mother, but all the mothers, so, it’s heavy but it’s also, I can say that I think it will finish with happy feeling. I think so.

Alistair: Is it about grief as well, then?

Sharon: Yeah. And it’s about life and death, at same time because it’s also the same.

Alistair: Yes, okay.

Sharon: But yeah, most of the time I’m not saying what I’m doing because I don’t like the subject,
but this one is very. It is. So I can.

Alistair: Do you think it will look different then? Or do you think we’ll feel, experience

Sharon: You will feel different

Alistair: Yes, interesting.

Sharon: Yeah. I think there is something already I start to work on it and I feel like, you know, pieces are different. Each baby is different.

Alistair: Of course

Sharon: It’s coming more clear and more like it’s almost. I see, you know, I always see, but now it’s like, even more.

Alistair: Yeah. And do you ever think further away than the next piece or, you know, how do you see the next ten years? Do you ever think about that?

Sharon: I just want to do what I’m doing. I love what I’m doing. I would love to do more collaboration with people that I love. I want to be healthy and can dance forever because I think the moment I cannot dance myself, I think I will stop creating. I don’t think I can do it without my body, so I just want to continue.

Alistair: That’s interesting you say that. So when you say that you, so you mean that you, because you told me actually, you do the dance class every day because you’re a dancer is what you’re saying?

Sharon: I says first of all, I’m dancer.

Alistair: Yes, yes. And what does that mean then so in terms of the creation you want to be you’re not just showing, you’re doing.

Sharon: I don’t believe in talking so much I really believe in physicality. So I don’t know how long. I don’t know, maybe I can dance until I will be 100. But, I feel like the physicality have to start from my body, and maybe it will change the physicality. And this is also okay, but I have to continue moving and dance and go from there. It’s like the baby is going from my body.

Alistair: Yes. Right. So I mean, that’s something we really believe, we even have a festival here called Elixir, which celebrates the fact that you, you can keep dancing. And Anne Teresa has just opened, Anne Teresa De Keersmaeker. A Belgium choreographer has just opened a new show as well, on BREL.

Sharon: Amazing.

Alistair: And she’s dancing with one other person at least and she’s, I think, in her 60s. So it’s certainly possible.And we we support that because I think one thing that happens in dance is that the experience you get. Say as an actor that you increase as you go through your career. In dance, lots of people will lose that experience.

Sharon: But, you know, you can do dance in a very different ways. The experience that you got can build some physicality. You know, you don’t need to do like, crazy jump or stuff like that, but you can do something very minimalistic with all your experience, and it will be like the most extreme.I really believe in this extremity and in the minimalistic. You know, I always say to the dancers, find the extreme in the nothing, you know. You don’t need to move, you know. To be extreme, you can find it in different way.

Alistair: Well, thank you very much. Well thank you very much for this conversation. It was lovely. And we look forward to those next
20, 30, 40 years.

Sharon: Yes, I hope so.

Alistair: Thank you Sharon.

Sharon: Thank you Alistair. Thank you.