Shared evening
Avshalom Latucha | Roy Assaf

Avshalom Latucha • Lines, Nets and Traps

Three horizontal lines in space. Straight lines, rigid lines. Their linearity is indisputable; it cannot be questioned. They define the direction; they mark a clear vector. They are the definitive limits of a reality that exists between them, and in their presence, there is potential change. Three dancers standing in space, somewhat crooked, carrying themselves from here to there, carrying themselves nowhere, doing their best to pose a new linearity in space. Time after time, they break against the rigid line, redrawing motivation to go on, change the line, and bend reality.

They wash over the plane in complete devotion, but they will come to reason and see that in the end, there always is an end, the tide falls, the line remains a line, and the only possible change to occur Is within.

Gianni Notarnicola’s performance that was planned for the shared evening was canceled due to the cancellation of his flight to Israel, and instead Roy Assaf Dance Company will perform an excerpt from “Figure No. 16”

Roy Assaf • Excerpt from “Figure No. 16”

Figure No. 16 is a work for three dancers and a mic, or, a dance for two couples in a series of 1000 beginnings. A dance that owes its life to Hokuto and Mariko, to Johannes in the 19th century, to Johannes in the 21st, to Glenn (meter be damned), to Roland, Neema, to the most beautiful girl in Rockville Maryland to Popai, to the boy who gave up on a wall full of diplomas and to Josef from Budapest, to love, to hate, to a child prodigy, to a monster, to a ghost, to adolescence, to a nervous breakdown, to a vase of flowers, to a bearded elephant, to a camel who swims in pond, to name a few. Figure No. 16 is a dance for a single spectator, the one person who decides its fate, and if it is even really a dance. 

Avshalom Latucha began his journey with dance at Haifa Dance Workshop in Israel. Upon finishing his studies in Haifa, he met Roy Assaf, with whom he worked primarily as a dancer and then as an artistic associate in his creations in Israel and abroad. He engages in artistic dialogues with talented and generous artists such as Adi Boutrous, Yossi Berg & Oded Graf, Mor Shani, Omri Drumlevich, and others – as many as time enables. In 2022, he started creating his own works as part of Suzanne Dellal Centre’s 1|2|3 program for emerging choreographers. The program awarded him first prize for two of his creations. 

In the fall of 2023, he participated in residencies in Brussels and Köln where he worked on his new piece that will be presented in this year’s Tel-Aviv Dance Festival.

Roy Assaf was born in 1982 in the rural community of Sde Moshe in southern Israel/Palestine. He broke his front tooth at the age of five while dancing on the slippery floor of his family home. At age of six, he began giving tap concerts for his neighbor, who watched him dance on his concrete balcony from her window across the yard. From 1990 to 1996 he began creating and performing his own dances for monthly family gatherings in Jerusalem. In 1997 a performance by Batsheva – The Young Ensemble revealed to Roy his desire to pursue a career in dance. At the age of 16 he met Regba Gilboa, an educator, dance lover, and believer in people who rooted in Roy the confidence that dance is where he belongs. Between 1998 and 2000, endless hours were spent in Regba’s red Volkswagen, on the road to another show or workshop. Two years later Roy was drafted into the Israel Defence Forces (not a point of pride, but part of his past which cannot be denied), where, with a vest, helmet and a rifle on his shoulder he danced through his 8-hour checkpoint shifts. In 2004, he met Emanuel Gat who introduced him to Schubert and for whom he wore his first dress. With Gat he spent many hours in airports, hotels, cocktails, photo calls, post-show discussions, grueling technical nights, and fancy galas evenings with giants. In 2005 Roy met Anat Inditzky who loves him for all his shortcomings to this day. Between 2008 and 2017 he met Aya, Nuri, Layla and Jona who continue to teach him about patience, among many other things. In 2010, after three years in France, He came back to Israel. And after one year of idleness he gathered the courage to make a dance… After which he created another and another… and continues to this day.