Yeliz Pazar - "POINT OF NO RETURN"
The "point of no return" is a moment that changes life entirely. It can happen suddenly and unexpectedly or be long-awaited. It is the point of no return, where change occurs, whether self-determined or imposed by external forces. What makes a moment become such a crucial event in this way? When does this moment begin and when does it end? In POINT OF NO RETURN, five dancers dedicate themselves to these questions, using the dance style Waacking as the central element. Waacking stands for expressing and celebrating one's own strength beyond heteronormative norms.
Waacking is a dance style that originated in the disco era of the 1970s in the Afro Latinx American LGBTQ* community in Los Angeles. Queer individuals experienced exclusion and discrimination in society and had to hide their identities. However, in clubs, they could be themselves. Thus, Waacking became a dance form expressing resistance against oppression by racism, sexism, and homophobia, and celebrating aspects that are still viewed as "weak" today: femininity, vulnerability, emotionality. Typical elements include rotating arm movements, poses, and emphasis on expressiveness, all in connection with disco music.
Yeliz Pazar aka Yeliz Manuka is a dancer and choreographer from Düsseldorf and co-founder of the dance collective nutrospektif (2020 - 2022 Factory Artists, tanzhaus nrw). Her work aims to make urban dance cultures such as Waacking more visible in a stage context and advance them in the dance landscape. She has choreographed works such as Djinn at the Düsseldorf Schauspielhaus, Get Together at the Oper Köln, and NUTRO 10 - A nutrospective at tanzhaus nrw. Since 2008, she has been part of the first generation of Waacking dancers in Germany. In 2018, she founded the Manuka Waacking Flowers, a Waacking crew from NRW. In the same year, she organized THE WAACK OFF at tanzhaus nrw, the first international event of its kind in Germany. For POINT OF NO RETURN, she collaborates with Waacking dancers Enting Zhang, Kristina Kunn, and Kevin Claudio Ponge Kassoma, among others.
Duration: approx. 60 minutes.
Hallo, ich bin Maya.
