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Butoh and Nigerian Dance at Genoa's Testimonianze Ricerca Azioni Festival

festival-fair · 2026-05-05

The Testimonianze Ricerca Azioni festival, organized by Teatro Akropolis in Genoa for seven years, stands out for its deep engagement with artists and its publication of a theoretical volume each year. Artistic directors Clemente Tafuri and David Beronio curate a program featuring unusual artists. Swiss dancer Imre Thormann, a direct student of butoh co-founder Kazuo Ōno for seven years, presented 'Enduring Freedom' at Villa Rossi Martini. The piece, inspired by the U.S. military operations after 9/11, explores freedom amid pain and death. Thormann's performance involved a slow undressing and a progression of internal tensions, broken lines, and segmented contortions, embodying a pre-human or hyper-human body. In contrast, Nigerian dancer Qudus Onikeku's 'My Exile is in My Head' suffered from an excess of signs—video projections, lights, psychoanalytic texts, songs, screams—resulting in a chaotic, noisy effect that undermined its evocative intent. The festival's diptych interrogated emptiness and silence, echoing John Cage's 4'33''.

Key facts

  • Testimonianze Ricerca Azioni is a festival organized by Teatro Akropolis in Genoa for seven years.
  • The festival publishes a theoretical volume each year with contributions from artists, critics, and intellectuals.
  • Artistic directors are Clemente Tafuri and David Beronio.
  • Imre Thormann studied butoh directly with co-founder Kazuo Ōno for seven years.
  • Thormann's 'Enduring Freedom' was performed at Villa Rossi Martini.
  • The title references U.S. military operations after the September 11, 2001 attacks.
  • Qudus Onikeku's 'My Exile is in My Head' features video projections, lights, texts, songs, and screams.
  • The festival's diptych explores emptiness and silence, referencing John Cage's 4'33''.

Entities

Artists

  • Imre Thormann
  • Kazuo Ōno
  • Qudus Onikeku
  • Elena Cervellati
  • Jean-Luc Nancy
  • John Cage
  • Clemente Tafuri
  • David Beronio

Institutions

  • Teatro Akropolis
  • Villa Rossi Martini
  • Artribune

Locations

  • Genoa
  • Italy
  • Switzerland
  • Nigeria
  • Japan
  • United States of America

Sources