BQdanza's quotes 2010 - 2011

“Oh, the costumes. They’re magnificent. They’re animated stuffed animals, imaginary friends made flesh; they’re a palette of orange and yellow and green and gray that would fit well in a beautiful children’s book. Some have faces on the front and back of their heads, some have their disproportionate bones stitched on the outside of their bodies; adding to the whimsy, are an enlarged shoulder, a pair of puffy legs, or strange grasping fingers. The work was glorious because the space was transformed by these characters’ curious, oddly-shaped presence. The dancers became other than themselves, their bodies reshaped and their heads enormous. The world of the dance was unbalanced, jungle-like, and alien—a mysterious new reality where anything could happen.”

(Victoria Jacobs March 4 SeattleDances)

"Barragan, an Ecuadorian-American choreographer who's known for inventive, thoughtful site-specific work in Tacoma, Seattle, South America and elsewhere, has turned for her 20-minute Tollefson piece to the Gulf oil spill. In “Thick,” dancers from Barragan’s group BQDanza move around the plaza to a soundscape involving poetry by local spoken word artist Lucas Smiraldo. The piece “mourns the loss of and also celebrates the beauty and grace of birds, sea creatures, micro-organisms and other non-human victims of the region”.

(Rosemary Ponnekanti The News Tribune August 13, 2012)

““Thick” is well-designed, graceful and captures that particularly impotent sense of regret whenever one imagines all those land, sea and air creatures so devastated by the thick black gunk coating their world. Barragan’s dancers, clad in orange and black tunic and pants, roam the plaza, claiming it as their own. This unlikely feat is very hard to do in Tollefson’s wide space – plenty of performers have tried it and failed – but “Thick” does it with serenity. As the dancers move with arched, angled bird-like movements from street benches to ramp to steps they tell tales of beauty fettered.”

(Rosemary Ponnekanti / The News Tribune on Sep. 21, 2010)

“On Sept. 16, Tacoma-based choreographer Carla Barragán and BQdanza dance troupe debuted a new work, Thick, at Tollefson Plaza. The site-specific performance is a response to the Gulf Coast oil spill and represents the enormity of the tragedy through a kinesthetic interpretation of the ecosystem’s birds and wildlife. The dance incorporated its cascade pools. Those who were in attendance agreed: It was a pleasure to see humans moving in harmony with nature (i.e., the drizzly fall weather) instead of assaulting the earth, as from, say, an oil rig.”

(Space works Tacoma)

ON SENTATA...

Carla Barragán's choreography is a subversive mix of rigorous modern dance and delicate physical allusion. (SANDRA KURTZ performance picks Seattle Weekly, 2004) ON SENTATA

ON SUSURROS...

“to finish the evening, Carla Barragán brilliantly closed the evening with Susurros. The piece precisely conjugated ethnic dances, minimalist movement and video.”

(El Comercio, Ecuador, 2003)

ON PAWAY...

"Five artists offered their bodies to create a mosaic of Andean experiences as well as the chaotic beauty of any Latin American metropolis. A piece with a post-modern taste, Birlibirloque conjugates several techniques in this project."

(El Comercio 9/21/02)

"The piece counts on several resources that make it unique: an attractive set that adapts itself to a town, a cantina or a market. The use of color also adds vitality, and in equal manner the giant puppets visibly contrast with the actors and small puppets."

(El Hoy 9/24/02)

Latin American magical realism meets international modern dance and puppetry in this eventful . . . hybrid performance by Birlibirloque Dance 

(Joe Adcock, The Seattle P-I 5/02)

"In Eruption . . .we saw gorgeous images of dancers becoming tecnonic layers, shifting and re-shifting to the rythm of an unknown wisdom."

(Sofia Guerrero, El Universo. Ecuador, 2000)

"Carla Barragan created a piece inspired Pichincha volcanoe´s Eruption. The contained alusions were clear and ocassionaly humorous. Eruption was an explosion of expressive possibilities." 

(Cesar Carrion, El Comercio. Ecuador, 2000)

PREVIOUS REVIOUS QUOTES ON OTHER WORK:

"In the solos and group work, Carla Barragan displays a high professionalism that involves the audience in a game of movement, music and lights. Carla manages to generate, through her choreography, the meaning of her companyÕs name: magic."

(letters to the editor, El Comercio. Ecuador, 1991)

Barragán as a performer in Senta Driver´s Harry... "In "Us Do Part" Michael Blake and Sam Costa, with Carla Barragan, Holly Humble, Kathryn Millostan-Egus and Kollen Martinsen roll out on the floor and dance with alternately bulky and light steps. The dancers«dexterity and stamina are exceptional." 

(Anna Kisselgoff, The New York Times. New York, 1991)

"Birlibirloque´s four women choreographers share a flamboyant feminism, an obsession with damning details, and a tendency to launch poetic ambushes out of nowhere" 

(Eva Yaa Asantewaa, The Village Voice. New York, 1992)

"A women´s show that talks about women being held by images and movements that purify them, releasing them of guilt, religions, love and hate."

(Amparo Valencia, 15 Dias Magazine. Ecuador, 1993)

"Birlibirloque gives back to us that the forgotten sense of love and tenacity, of search and dirsovery." 

(Natasha Salguero, Hoy. Ecuador, 1994)

"In Ballad for a woman who forgot,, (choreographed and danced by Barragan) the whole dance breathes a strong personal expressivity, movement unfolds assymetrically and with energy ready to burst. The show brings about a feeling of renovation in the artistic ambience. "

(Alfredo Breilh, Hoy. Ecuador, 1997)

About Carla Barragan.. in "Movimientos" "the dancer's performance decomposes into cuasi-abstract geometry until it sinks In her skins' texture and it becomes an animated landscape with micro seismic oscillations before the human figure returns to movement- something between lightness and pure energy"

(Marc Saint Upery, El Universo. Ecuador 4/98)