Moving Still

Sculpture installation as well as a complex experience. Nine sculptures, in public space, next to the National Theatre, infinitely many stories, simple questions: here and there, inside, or outside? Stillness does not exist. Beauty? Certainly…

The installation Moving Still will open on June 26, 2024 on the Václav Havel Square in Prague. The opening will be preceded by an exclusive program at the National Theatre curated by Jiří Kylián. The program at the National Theatre will include Jiří Kylián’s films: Schwarzfahrer, Scalamare, Between Entrance and Exit and Car-men. Czech actor Jiří Lábus, the famous Norwegian jazz trumpetist and composer Nils Petter Molvær and more than 50 dancers and actors will guide you through the interludes. 

Jiří Kyllián about his project: 

"I asked eight dancers I've worked with for many years if they would agree to be digitally scanned naked in three dimensions, printed life-sized, and exhibited as part of my installation titled Moving Still. They all agreed. Lorraine Blouin, Cora Kroese, Valentina Scaglia, Shirley Esseboom, David Krügel, Ken Ossola, Stefan Żeromski, and Michael Schumacher. I've always been fascinated not only by movement but also by the question of whether we are inside some space or outside. That's why my sculptures are both inside and outside, sometimes passing through... and yes, their bodies are sliced in two.

I began working on this project in October 2021 when the pandemic hit, and we were not allowed to move. That's why I named this installation Moving Still. They are objects flying between being and non-being, bodies carrying the scars of life. 

But that wasn't the only source of my inspiration. It was also immobility. It was mainly the stiff remains – the "statues" of people who died in Pompeii after the eruption of Mount Vesuvius in 79 AD. They perished 1945 years ago, but we are still deeply moved by their immobility..."

The installation Moving Still will be on display until June 30, 2024 on the Václav Havel Square free to the public.

Jiří Kylián belongs to world renowned names. His works are iconic and his choreographies are the jewels of repertoires of all the most prestigious world ensembles. During his professional career he created hundreds of choregraphies, seventy five of which were for Nederlands Dans Theater in The Hague, 

the rest for the Stuttgarter Ballett, Paris Opéra, Bayerisches Staatsballett, Tokyo Ballet and others. His works have been cornerstones of the repertoire of all renowned dance companies worldwide.

Jiří Kylián created his most recent choreography, Remember me, for the dancer Sabine Kupferberg, his Muse, in 2019 on the occasion of his inauguration in Paris as a member of the Académie des beaux-arts, which is the highest honour in arts. Previously, the prestigious institution had granted membership in seven disciplines. Upon Kylián’s naming, on 25 April 2019, choreography (and dance) became a new category.