SOL PICÓ

“My body is a cocktail of all the techniques acquired and something curious came out”.



Curious and unique, I’d say. Ironic, sharp, communicative, involving. Full of energy. Positive and critic at the same time.
After creating the company that bears her name, in 1993, the dancer and choreographer from Valencia managed to become famous with performances as Bésame el cactus (Kiss my cactus), provocative and ironic solo where the artist plays with different materials and with the public, or Amor diesel (Diesel love), choreography for dancer and excavators. From these works came the collaboration with the National Theatre of Catalonia and the possibility to realize productions as La mujer manca o Barbi-superstar, which explores the world of women through the de-construction and re-construction of the feminine imaginary. Or Paella Mixta, a noisy and fast moving world, seducing and fighting, populated by strange creatures that seem to have escaped from a comic strip or from a strange religious order.
Surely, one of the most evident features of Sol Picó’s work is dynamicity, the ability to observe at 360º, without barriers nor prejudices, with a free and humoristic attitude. A daily work, carried on with the constancy and seriousness of a scientific research, a surgical investigation over the body of the society we are dipped in. It’s like when we sit in the same position for a long time and suddenly we realize that a leg doesn’t respond to any stimulus, it got slept and doesn’t seem to belong to us anymore. And so shake, pinch until it hurts but you hold on and slowly the conscience comes back and you recover a part of you that for a while you thought you’d lost.

And every time that a performance ends, the wish to have more remains, the curiosity to know what this incredible artist will be able to find out next time. But don’t worry, “I’ve dance in me for a long while”.

gg. Once you said that your dance “rises in you entrails and takes shape in your head”. Can you tell us your creative process, how does an emotion becomes a choreography? 

sp.First of all it generates in the soul, uneasiness, desire to move. I move, I move and little by little a shape appears. Doubts, I do, undo, horrible... at last, after so much coming and going, something satisfying starts to come out. The choreographic work can start.

gg. Some of your creations have been realized in the street and present some features of the street theatre. I’m referring in particular to La divadivina. Is there in your work a specific interest toward the intervention in the public space and do you think it could be a way to break the distance – that seems to affect all the contemporary arts – between artist and “no-specialized” public?

sp. I love to feel the public close, his breath, his comments, to see their faces, recognize them…the woman that walks around and runs up against a dance show she likes… it’s essential.

gg. Your works are often provocative and they seem to try and awaken the spectator, to involve him in what’s happening on the stage. In this frame, which role does irony play? Do you think it is a good tool to convey a message?

sp. The world is sick and we are too, more o less. It’s fundamental to laugh about ourselves and deal the public in this. 

gg. The representation of sexuality – masculine and feminine, ethero and homosexual – has been one f the most interesting investigation fields of artists from the ‘60s. In Spain, apart some exceptions, the recuperation the body as an object of the artistic practice has suffered a delay caused also by the Franco’s regime. Only in the last few decades many artists started to explore feminine identity under different perspectives, as the photographer  Itziar Okariz or Ana Laura Aláez. In you work you explored the woman universe in different ways…

sp. The woman is an inexhaustible source of inspiration, it comes out easy to me, it’s enriching and it’s always surprising. Even if man is not to be cast away.

gg. One of you fields of investigation is body, its mercification and objectification, its transformation on a non-place. It seems that the main difference between the central importance of body in contemporary art and in the ‘60s art is the massive use of new technologies, the distance they establish between public and performance. What do you think about the potential inscribed in the use of technology and about its effect with respect to the public?

sp. New technologies are necessary, it’s good to know them and know how to use them… although I am still on the way, at present they don’t inspire me so much.

gg. Talking about the woman and the feminine universe, tell us something about MASCLetà, the project you are currently involved in. Thee women choreographers direct male dancers... 

sp. As a dance councelor at the National Theatre of Catalunya, every season I do a different proposal, whose premise is o look for the individuality of the choreographer. In this case the proposal deals with man in the XX century seen though the eyes of women choreographers, working exclusively with men. A good experiment...

gg. Which is the biggest professional challenge you faced?

sp. Everything, even the littlest thing, entails an incredible tension and desire to drop everything… maybe the direction of the Max Award in 2007 was the biggest challenge for me. 

gg. Which is, in your opinion, the most interesting aspect of contemporary society to represent though dance?

sp. No comment.

gg. Often form the outside a country is seen as a whole, something homogeneous, although in the inside it presents deep differences on a social, cultural and historical level. How would you define the politicy of Catalunya in matter of culture and live show? How does it places compared with the rest of Spain?

sp. Catalunya’s policy  concerning dance, and culture in general, is insufficient and in the challenge of the country leave much to be desired.

gg. For a long time Barcelona has been considered, especially abroad, an “happy island”, a paradise for artists and creators in this field. Is it still like this or something has changed in the last years?

sp. It has quite changed, although you can live very well here. At least it seems to me a complete city, a little “stuffed” but petty nice.

gg. Are there feelings that dance cannot express?

sp. Dance can express everything, everything...

By Giulia Guerrini