There are movements we make without thinking, and others we learn to control. Sometimes, there is an unstable zone in between, where the body no longer fully follows the rules. That is where “Unauthorized Movements” begins.
Project Concept
The focus on analyzing, measuring, and optimizing human movement runs through industrial modernity. Within scientific management and other practices developed in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, movement became a central object of study and intervention. Human activity was reorganized according to criteria of efficiency and productivity. Whatever did not fit these norms became, by default, unauthorized. The body was thus integrated into a precise, repetitive, and controlled system of operation.
Mișcarea este astăzi cartografiată, codificată și limitată printr-o varietate de mecanisme, de la frontiere geopolitice și infrastructuri urbane, la tehnologii de supraveghere, dispozitive de tracking și norme sociale internalizate. În acest context corpul funcționează simultan ca obiect de control și ca mediu de negociere. Cum evită corpurile, identitățile și gesturile taxonomiile puterii?
Cele 4 lucrări semnate de Eduard Gabia, Paula Dunker, Ana Costea, Mihai Mihalcea & Mara Bugarin în cadrul proiectului Mișcări neautorizate se înscriu în acest câmp de reflecție și îl abordează dintr-o perspectivă performativă. Proiectul investighează potențialul eliberator al mișcării și al dansului de a genera spații de gândire în care ceea ce scapă codificării, clasificării sau recunoașterii ne inspiră.
Într-un context din ce în ce mai problematic în care autoritarismul și controlul se intensifică și insistă asupra sistematizării și supravegherii fiecărui aspect al existenței, proiectul Mișcări neautorizate reclamă dreptul la libertatea de mișcare în forme care nu pot fi capturate și controlate. A te mișca fără permisiune înseamnă a revendica spațiu într-o lume care caută să îl delimiteze. A crea mișcare înseamnă a afirma prezența imprevizibilului, a necunoscutului, a libertății.
About the performances and artists
“Unauthorized Movements” brings together four works that view the body as a site of tension between control and deviation, between what is permitted and what slips away.
Eduard Gabia works with the idea of translation (between language and body, between instruction and action) in a process where meaning is constantly lost and reconstructed.
Paula Dunker starts with text and pushes it into the body, in an accumulation that becomes physical, intense, hard to stop, almost impossible to keep in shape.
Ana Costea brings to the forefront gestures that are usually viewed as “outside the norm” (adjusting, repetitive, intimate movements) and proposes them as a form of presence and expression.
Mihai Mihalcea & Mara Bugarin together construct a space where history, fiction, and the present overlap, and the body becomes the place where these layers meet and destabilize one another.
Împreună, aceste lucrări nu oferă o singură direcție, ci mai degrabă deschid un câmp: moduri diferite în care mișcarea poate ieși din ceea ce e previzibil.
Schedule
On April 19 and 26, 2026, at 7:00 p.m., the National Center for Dance in Bucharest will host the first performances as part of the Unauthorized Movements project.
The two works—CODE-SWITCH by Eduard Gabia and this is a lot, but there is more and more is more by Paula Dunker—will be presented as a double bill on both evenings.
CODE-SWITCH
by Eduard Gabia
Duration: 46 min
The performance explores the relationship between language, movement, and action through a process of translation between different systems. Starting from the structure of a lecture on effective communication, the performer’s body attempts to translate verbal instructions into gestures and choreographed actions, generating a space in which meaning is not fixed but continuously negotiated.
this is a lot, but there is more and more is more
by Paula Dunker
Set design: Mălina Ionescu
Music: Alex Bălă
Duration: approx. 40 min
The work begins with a poetic text that is brought to life through performance, in a journey where voice, body, and action construct a space of exposure and transformation. In this context, the proposed gestures and images become ways of exploring the relationship between vulnerability, labor, and emotion.
Organization and partners
Production
A project by the Solitude Project Cultural Association, in partnership with the National Centre for Dance in Bucharest.
Co-funded by
The Administration of the National Cultural Fund.
The project does not necessarily reflect the views of the Administration of the National Cultural Fund. The Administration of the National Cultural Fund is not responsible for the content of the project or for how the project’s results may be used. These are entirely the responsibility of the grant recipient.
Partners
Brain Store Project, Antistatic International Contemporary Dance Festival, Reactor for Creation and Experimentation