Stakes are high and the potential to fall too. In the piece Bien y Mal by choreographer Ofelia Jarl Ortega, five characters are facing the same fate, dealing with it in different ways. What at first seems graspable is displaced, and becomes uncertainty. There are neither good nor bad intentions, only devotion. It’s a negotiation between fiction and factuality, naïvety and cunningness. Time is delicate, the asymmetry becomes clear as an unconditional bond takes shape. Any stance is commented upon from another place, which brings us closer to them, but not more certain about what will happen. The five find strategies to move forward, even if they don’t have anything in common since nothing binds them, apart from what we, the audience, can unite them with. They keep us on the edge, in a breathtaking place, as our perception is trained and gets more nuanced. It’s not possible to do anything or to protect oneself, it’s an invitation to await the consequences.

Ofelia Jarl Ortega (b. 1990) is a Chilean-Swedish choreographer and performer based in Stockholm. Her work centers around vulnerability and femininity, often with a suggestive erotic aesthetic; where questions around power and group dynamics are at the core of her investigations. She holds a diploma from The Royal Swedish Ballet School (2010) and a MA in Choreography from Stockholm University of the Arts (2014). Her works have been shown at venues such as ImPulsTanz (Vienna), MDT (Stockholm), Dansstationen (Malmö), Arsenic – Contemporary Performing Arts Center (Lausanne), and Moving in November (Helsinki).

Presented “Shredder” at Arsenic 2018 and “StM” (coproduction) 2019.