Lenio Kaklea’s Αγρίμι (Fauve) brought her signature exploration of identity and movement to the Serpentine in the fall of 2024. Inspired by the poetic yet chaotic nature of the forest, the piece imagined rituals anew, interrupting human perceptions and merging romantic ballet with contemporary forms. With this latest work, Kaklea invited audiences to explore a dialogue between art and ecology on the Serpentine stage.
hube: You describe forests as places of calm, and ecstasy, but also threat and toxicity. How do these contrasting emotions manifest in Αγρίμι (Fauve)?
Lenio Kaklea: In Αγρίμι (Fauve), I chose to explore choreographically how forests challenge humans’ perception of orientation, verticality, and the circulation of light – how humans and animals live in them, play and hunt in them, or perform rituals. I also drew inspiration from how forests have been represented historically in dance, particularly during the Romantic period in classical ballet, as places where invisible, imaginary creatures live.
h: As the first work connecting your choreography to the geographical and poetic richness of forests, what challenges did you face in embodying these complex ecosystems in dance?
LK: The piece is structured in two acts, following the way Romantic ballets such as Giselle were choreographed. In the first act, our dance happens on the frontier of the forest, while in the second act, the performers move inside it and engage in rituals of transformation. The first act is composed of two distinct scenes. The first borrows gestural elements from well-known pop choreography and presents itself as a game of seduction between the performers and the audience.
The second scene involves the intense repetition of a rhythmic spatial pattern, allowing the performers to constantly move in space, challenge our perception of orientation, and shift roles from hunter to prey in a continuous exchange of gazes. In the second act, I propose an imaginary ritual that embraces elements of violence and eroticism. In the very last scene of the piece, the performers climb poles, and the audience can contemplate a scene where human bodies physically negotiate with verticality. Here, the trees of the forest are seen as a place of refuge.
h: Your work often examines how movements shape and reveal our identities. How does Αγρίμι (Fauve) expand on or diverge from this ongoing exploration in your practice?
LK: My previous works focused on revealing the multiplicity of female identities and the way physical and spiritual practices play a role in our social construction, defined by the political context we live in. With Αγρίμι (Fauve), I wanted to initiate a new cycle of works around ecologies and the complex, contradictory relationships humans maintain with nature. For this work, I didn’t conduct fieldwork myself but studied anthropological research. I initiated a discussion with French anthropologist Charles Stepanoff, who advised me to work with a tale of the Nivkh people in Siberia, whom he had encountered while living with them.
The main challenge in making this work was how to use embodied observations of nature while distancing myself from documentary forms widely used to explain nature (like documentaries or Discovery Channel broadcasts). The formal challenge was to develop a hybrid stage that proposed a poetic and critical experience rather than a narrative or didactic one.
h: You’ve spoken about choreography as a means of producing subjectivity. In Αγρίμι (Fauve), do you see dance as a way to return to a more primal, less constructed form of selfhood?
LK: I defend dance’s capacity to propose a critical aesthetic experience through form. The theatre is one of many spaces where dance is produced, and its long and diverse history allows it to offer moments where communities come together to reflect on society. In Fauve, we do not pretend to reach a primal state of consciousness – which I personally have never experienced and wouldn’t know how to speak about. Instead, the piece offers a rough, post-Brechtian interpretation of romanticism and rituals, revealing how both affection and violence are present in human activities, structuring our relationships with nature and ourselves.
h: With an illustrious career spanning continents and disciplines, what drives your artistic practice today, and where do you see your work evolving in the future?
LK: Continuing my reflections on ecologies, I’m currently preparing a large-scale stage work for seven performers called The Birds. From Aristophanes to Hitchcock, birds have always held a special place in our imagination. Sometimes a symbol of freedom and equality, sometimes an aggressive and dangerous figure, they are a universally resonant subject. The dramatic extinction of bird species over the last forty years is emblematic of environmental struggles for biodiversity. Silent Spring, one of the first ecological manifestos, recounts the disappearance of songs that once marked the changing seasons. Alarmed by this reality, I decided to dedicate my next piece to studying the figure of birds. The choreography will vary in intensity, rhythm, and spatial directions. Using various set elements, dancers will defy gravity. Cameras will project the action from different angles, reminding us of themes of surveillance and prompting questions about frontiers.
h: From collaborating with Lucinda Childs to working with Bottega Veneta, your career bridges art, fashion, and music. What do these interdisciplinary collaborations bring to your choreographic practice?
LK: I don’t necessarily think of myself as an avant-garde artist, but I conceive my practice in those terms. I resist academic disciplinary boundaries, which would label my art as dance, theatre, or visual arts, and instead think of my work as a constant formal rearrangement of elements – including movement, sound, text, and visuals. I also deeply enjoy collaborating and learning from other artists. Both my collaborations with Lucinda Childs and Matthieu Blazy have been seminal moments in my journey.
h: How did your academic background, including studying at Sciences Politiques, influence the way you approach choreography and the relationship between the body and environment?
LK: Studying close to an influential French philosopher like Bruno Latour allowed me to step out of the dance studio, work collectively with scientists (historians, anthropologists, architects, etc.), and familiarize myself with basic anthropological tools such as field research and interviews. Most importantly, it enabled me to embrace a multidisciplinary methodology, which allowed me to investigate the contours of our society more deeply. I learned – and am still learning – how we construct ourselves through movement, not only in the dance studio but across social, political, institutional, and intimate contexts.
h: Dance has entered spaces like private and public collections, as seen with your work. How do you see dance as an art form evolving within the context of museums and collections?
LK: I’m always happy to receive invitations from visual arts institutions to present my work and to see museums invest in dance as a time-based practice capable of offering critical narratives about the body and the world. That said, there is still significant economic disparity in the art market between object-oriented and choreographic practices. I believe we’re in the midst of a long process where museums, along with public and private collections, are evolving their infrastructures to better integrate protocol-based or dance works. I’m hopeful that we’ll see even more choreographers’ retrospectives and exhibition projects in the future.
Photography by MARIA TOULTSA courtesy of the artist
