About

                                                                                                                                                           
 
MATANICOLA 
After working with prestigious international companies and artists such as Sasha Waltz & Guests, Batsheva Dance Company, Benoit Lachambre, Ohad Naharin, Emio Greco/PC and Yasmeen Godder amongst others, Israeli choreographer and performer Matan Zamir and Italian Nicola Mascia founded the Berlin based collaborative duo matanicola. Since 2005, they been defining and developing their own approach to contemporary dance. Well known for their unique choreographic style and signature, their work deeply engage in questioning and redefining the boundaries of cultural and social definition, gender and national identity, highlighting the “queer”, the “other” and the alternative. Their body of work so far, includes seven productions: UNDER (Kurt Jooss Prize 2007), created in 2005 in collaboration with Israeli choreographer Yasmeen Godder, LADIES FIRST (2007), WHAT ON EARTH (2010), PIECE OF ME (2011), TO THIS PURPOSE ONLY (2013) for and with the Italian company Fattoria Vittadini, BODIESLANGUAGE (2014); BLEACH (2015) for and with Theater Thikwa; as well as an ongoing improvisation series: VERSUS (2006-on going) and INTERVENTION (2012-on going). Their work has been commissioned, co-produced and supported by Hauptstadtkulturfonds, Sasha Waltz & Guests, Sophiensaele, Tanz im August – Internationales Tanzfest and Radialsystem V in Berlin, Fonds Darstellende Künste e.V., European Association for Jewish Culture, Goethe Institut and Grand Theatre Groningen, Theater Freiburg amongst others and extensively presented in international festivals. In 2012, they have been invited by the Festival Les Grandes Traversées in Bordeaux, to curate the twelve edition of the festival entitled MATANICOLA’S MAGICAL MYSTERY TOUR. As duo, they have been also collaborating, as choreographers and performers, in music videos and live shows with artists such as Peaches, Hanayo and Mignon amongst others. Besides choreography and performance, matanicola regularly teach classes and their intensive movement research workshop THE “UNLEARNING” PROCESS internationally.

NICOLA MASCIA Nicola Mascia
Nicola Mascia was born in 1975 in Turin, Italy. He started dancing at the age of five, initially studying ballet with Loredana Furno and continuing with jazz and contemporary dance in Turin and Rome. While living in Italy, he worked with choreographers Claudia Bruni, Massimo Leanti and the company Amadossalto amongst others. In 1995, he spent the summer in Los Angeles where he trained at Joe Tremaine Dance Center. The following year, he moved to Berlin to work with the prestigious company Sasha Waltz & Guests. Over the next fifteen years, he was involved in the creation, performance and international touring of many productions, films and improvisation projects including “Allee der Kosmonauten”, “Zweiland”, “Na Zemlje”, “Dialoge 99/I and II”, “Körper”, “S”, “17 – 25/4 [Dialoge 2001]”, “nobody”, “insideout”, “Dialoge 04 – Palast der Republik”, “Dialoge 06 – Radiale Systeme”, “Jagden und Formen (Zustand 2008)”, “Dialoge 09 – Neues Museum” and “Dialoge 09 – MAXXI” amongst others. During this time, he also worked as choreographer and performer with various artists such as Emio Greco/PC, Benoit Lachambre, Constanza Macras, Joanna Dudley, Junko Wada, Jared Gradinger, AlexandLiane and Gianna Nannini amongst others. In 2003, he performed in the dance film “Elements of mine« directed by Norbert Servos and Khaled El-Hagar, for which he won the “Award for best onscreen performance” at the 13th Moving Pictures Festival of Dance on Film & Video in Toronto 2004. In 2005, together with Israeli choreographer and performer Matan Zamir, he co-founded the collaborative duo matanicola.

MATAN ZAMIR Matan Zamir
Matan Zamir was born in 1977 in Israel and grew up in Kibbutz Rosh-Hanikra. He started dancing in 1985, studying initially at the Kibbutz Contemporary Dance School (where he graduated in 1996) and at the Bat Dor Dance School. He was a scholarship recipient of the America-Israel Cultural Foundation. In 1996 he moved to Tel Aviv and joined the prestigious Batsheva Dance Company where he worked with several choreographers such as Ohad Naharin, Noa Dar, Lara Barsacq, Keren Levi, Niv Shenfeld, Saar Magal, Yossi Berg, Itzik Galili, Joaquin Sabate, Linda Gaudreau, Frederic Lascour and performed in works of Angelin Preljocaj and Jirí Kilian amongst others. He also worked with theatre directors Omri Nitzan (New Israeli Opera), Itzik Weingerten (Habima) and choreographers Yasmeen Godder, Inbal Pinto and Avshalom Polak, Amit Goldenberg/Yaara Dolev and Rami Be’er amongst others. He moved to Berlin in 2002 and since then has worked with various choreographers and artists including Sasha Waltz, Benoit Lachambre, Junko Wada and AlexandLiane amongst others. In 2005, together with Italian choreographer and performer Nicola Mascia, he co-founded the collaborative duo matanicola.
 
 
 
*Illustrations by Uli Knörzer