WE
create dance performances, films, and photography;
teach screendance workshops, composition and improvisation dance intensives;
create programs in support of local and international artists;
mentor and support choreographers and dance filmmakers through their creative process.
we are based in Sofia, Bulgaria and Philadelphia, USA.
News:
GWYN residency in Philadelphia artists for ’22/’23 are Lu Donovan and Katie Mills-Yatsko.
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BodyMeld Performance Research Academy 2023 in Sofia, Bulgaria. INTERNATIONAL and FREE professional training program. News Comming Soon.
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We Value:
Exchange of ideas, workshops, and sharing of methodologies.
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Community around rigorous research and/or experimentation and blending genres in dance performance.
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The experience of the audience.
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Popularizing experimental performance.
BodyMeld is the brainchild of multidisciplinary artist Zornitsa Stoyanova.
BodyMeld‘s mission is to support Zornitsa Stoyanova’s work as well as create programs that further conversation and collaboration in the local and global dance performance field. We care about a sustainable dance community and strive to connect with and serve other independent dance/performance makers locally and internationally. We value the exchange of ideas and sharing of methodologies. We care about rigorous research and experimentation in the field of dance both in performance and organizationally. We strive to create a community curious and excited about the blending of genres in performance, experimentalism and surviving and thriving in hard political climates.
We hope that through mutual effort we can elevate each other and further the research and expressions of contemporary and experimental dance. Through our programs, we also hope to popularize experimental/new dance by making it more accessible and understandable to our audiences.
We actively seek collaboration with organizations for artistic exchange. We have previously worked with Movement Research in New York City, Arts Station Foundation in Poland, Philadelphia Dance Projects, <fidget> Space, Mascher Space, Pew Center for the Arts and Heritage (previously known as Dance Advance), and Fringe Arts (previously known as Live Arts Festival), all in Philadelphia.
Who is Zornitsa Stoyanova?
Primarily a choreographer, dancer, and curator, I also do lighting, graphic design, work with video and sound, and am heavily influenced by visual art. As an immigrant and a mother, my body holds a plethora of identities that shape the content of my work.
As a choreographer, I use text, song, man-made materials, and movement to create performances. I am drawn to themes of otherness, womanhood, feminism, power dynamics, and vulnerability. My work is influenced by surrealism and science fiction. I often engage with my audience by inviting them on stage or choosing a non-traditional venue and format for my work. I also write occasionally for thINKingDANCE.net, where I am an editor.
I value experimentation, innovation, visual disorientation and interaction with my audience. I work from the visual, where producing video and photography often preseed the creation of live performance. My process is focused in the practice of emergence. Using specific tools I make a lot of visual, movement, text, and sound material. After looking at this material (sometimes for years) and examining its potentiality and meaning, I decide if it needs to be part of a performance.
Since 2013, I have worked with Mylar reflective material. I interrogate its potential for cultural meaning and use it to create new abstract and psychedelic imagery often related to otherness, alienation, and representation of sexuality. The creation of this sci-fi-inspired world started with photography and filmmaking and resulted with the works, Explicit Female(2016), Un-Seen (2019), And,roMeda(2020) and the in-progress show Brutal Honesty(2022-23).
A detailed bio you can find here.
For info about performances, or our digital projects, please check the menu.