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BJÖRN SÄFSTEN

In the work and practice of choreographer Björn Säfsten, the body and the mind and its connected actions are scrutinized, dissected and exposed.The focus is often to research how different methods of thinking patterns can alter the way we move.The choreography at hand is seen as a result of a dialog between each performers movement heritage and the choreographic proposition. The physical practice exposes images that result from a certain physical action, often attempting to transform it´s possible representations.

The work takes visual twists and turns, often moulding itself while being performed, establishing itself anew each time for each audience encounter. He aims to expose physical dilemmas, deliberately creating situations where the performer’s thoughts are revealed, opened up to the viewer. The work fools around with the notion of language – striving to confuse and divert the viewer from the regularity of bodily reading. The body is seen as a multiplex of wills, desires and directions, moving away from the notion of a bodily and mental entity. The exact texture of the singular movement stands at the core of the work.

Björn is also the initiator and curator of the festival Within Practice for contemporary dance practices, workshops, talks and explorative sessions. More info about Within Practice.

Haunted Desires

BJÖRN SÄFSTEN [SE] - Haunted Desires - March 7, 2025 - Inkonst, Malmö, Sweden - 19:00
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  • Inkonst, Malmö, Sweden
  • March 7, 2025
  • 19:00

Haunted Desires

BJÖRN SÄFSTEN [SE] - Haunted Desires - March 8, 2025 - Inkonst, Malmö, Sweden - 19:00
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  • Inkonst, Malmö, Sweden
  • March 8, 2025
  • 19:00

Conversation and movement workshop + 65

BJÖRN SÄFSTEN [SE] - Conversation and movement workshop + 65 - December 18, 2024 - Norrlandsoperan, Umeå - 10:00
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  • Norrlandsoperan, Umeå
  • December 18, 2024
  • 10:00

Photo credits: Märta Thisner

Haunted Desires

The social medias mirroring effect multiplies our desires and inhibitions, directing our attention to a place where we succumb to our own becoming. In the work Haunted desires, three white gay men delve into their own self-image, looking into the things they look at too much. Focusing on their screens and our seemingly hysterical obsession with coveted material and bodies. Here, the choreography delves into, infiltrates, and transforms the material that is constantly washing over us. From this, a dance is born, three beings baptized in arbitrary algorithms and abandoned in a place where all they can do is practice their own language.

In Haunted desires, Björn Säfsten delves further into man’s constant failures with communication and the impact these failures have on the individual. The work centers specifically on iconography created by men seeking to be desired by other men and the dancers explore whatever the algorithms constantly throw at them. The piece was created by having the dancers randomly select clips from their social media algorithms, which are now exposed on stage. Here, the autobiographical blends with the fictional, the sought-after with the real, in a mishmash of exposed, haunted desire. Do we have to become what we desire?

Credits
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Choreography: Björn Säfsten, in close collaboration with the dancers
Dancers: Pär Andersson, Philip Berlin and Sam Huczkowski
Music: Victor Saiz
Lighting: Jonatan Winbo
Set design: Björn Säfsten and Jonatan Winbo
Supported by the Swedish Arts Council, the Swedish Arts Grants Committee, the City of Stockholm, and Region Stockholm

Co-produced by Inkonst
Created in residence at La Caldera Centre de Creació de Dansa Barcelona

Duration: 60 min

Photo credits: Märta Thisner

And so we´re gone

Intricate mathematics, existential march, and artificial mundanity are set in motion in choreographer Björn Säfsten’s new work.

From intricate patterns of walking, twists, and sudden stops, the work ‘and so we’re gone’ emerges, forming a detailed yet fascinating web of movement. Central to the work lies the relation between the infinite nature of time and our own finite mortality. Who are we, in the midst of it all?

The work starts with a repeated pattern of walking and develops slowly. A choreographic approach infused with suspense, seriousness, and a dash of fantasy. Through rhythmic shifts, in the pattern of squares, geometries and rituals appear and within that an artificial mundanity is inserted, as snapshots, or are they fantasies? Chopped up intensities from a life lived and a life lost. Is it possible to embody something as abstract as the subjective experience of time? How are we stopped by a memory that suddenly attacks us? Do we understand the inexorable march of time, truly, or perhaps always too late?

Björn Säfsten continues to challenge our perception of time by exploring the abstract and the concrete in the smallest elements of movement, here together with a brilliant quartet of dancers who leave no one indifferent.

Premiere: 26 oktober 2023, Elverket, Stockholm

Credits
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Choreography: Björn Säfsten in close collaboration with the dancers.
Dancers: Pär Andersson, Philip Berlin, Jade Stenhuijs and Madeleine Lindh
Music: Hans Appelqvist
Costume design: Daniel Åkerström-Steen
Lighting: Susanna Hedin
Thanks to: Anja Arnquist

Duration: 60 min

Supported by: The Swedish Arts Council, The Swedish Arts Grants Committee, and Stockholm Stad

Photo credits: Joakim Nyström

I själva verket

An autobiographical and arbitrary all-knowing performance about something everybody does but no one knows what it is: dance!

The title “I själva verket” could in Swedish be read in two ways within this context. As a saying it would translate to “In fact”, but it can also be understood as “In the actual piece”. The title contains Anja Arnquist and Björn Säfstens ambition with this performance. It comes from a strive of wanting to answer and open up conversations that Säfsten has had the last 8 years with audience members regarding contemporary dance, theories of dance practices and why some work might look or be read in a certain way.

Björn Säfsten and Anja Arnquist has developed numerous formats individually and as collaborators such as inter-active perforamances, workshops and performance-lectures to find an adequate meeting ground with a general audience. Both has continually toured around Sweden with this type of projects. An experience that has made them notice patterns in what type of questions and worries that puzzles the audience when it comes to contemporary dance. The questions vary but a number of themes tends to come back. In “I själva verket” Björn attempts to talk and dance, sometimes simultaneously, to show, visualise, explain, question and juggle the complicated issues at hand, always with humour and gentleness.

Where does the movements in contemporary dance come from, how can they be interpreted and is there a right way to understand dance? Is dancing a sort of sign language, where movements have certain meaning? It often seems rather self-centered? And how can I relate the dance to the outside world, the artist or my own history?

Premiere: 29 April 2023, Dansplats Skog, Sweden

This piece is available in several different versions, including a Swedish and an English version (available from June 2024).

Credits
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Choreography: Björn Säfsten and Anja Arnquist
Performer: Björn Säfsten
Rehearsal director: Anja Arnquist
Set designer: Joakim Nyström
Lighting designer: Anton Andersson
Sound designer: Hans Appelqvist
Dramaturge: Gunilla Heilborn
Artistic expert in voguing: Fredrik Quiñones
Conversation partner during the process: Chrysa Parkinson
Production Säfsten Produktion, Nordberg Movement and Riksteatern
Extra thank you to: Aviance and Frida Selander
Co-production between Säfsten Produktion and Riksteatern

Duration: 60 min

Lost Night

In an abstract existence, three individuals come together in an attempt to talk and share a listening coexistence. They form a choir, a flock and at the same time are three different people who talk about what happened before. Together they process a multitude of emotions and attempt in different ways to categorise their impressions, actions and thoughts. Some emotions become embodied and wander away, others enable a physical space to serve as an outlet.

In Lost Night Björn Säfsten and dancers Sophie Augot, Alexander Gottfarb and Marianne Kjaersund attempt to approach the feeling of loss. It´s a puzzle of fictional situations whose building blocks process what it means to lose something or someone. In the performance, the dancers use words, sound, song and movement to take in and sing out the choreography. Composer Hans Appelkvist has created soundscapes, compositions and songs together with the dancers who perform them.

Premiere: 21 februari 2020, Atalante, Gothenburg

 

Credits
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Idea and choreography: Björn Säfsten in close collaboration with participating performers.
Dancers: Sophie Augot, Alexander Gottfarb, Marianne Kjaersund
Music: Hans Appelqvist
Light design: Susanna Hedin
Production manager: Anja Arnquist
Production: Säfsten Produktion and Nordberg Movement

Duration: 60 min

Made possible with support by the Swedish Arts Council, The Swedish Arts Grants Committee, Stockholms Stad. Residencies at The Swedish Arts Council and Arbeitsplatz Wien.

Photo credits: Chrisander Brun

Conversation and movement workshop + 65

This full-day workshop is specially tailored for an older, culture-interested audience, who usually sit in the theatre and perhaps wonders why the dance looks the way it does. How is choreography created? And are there certain things one should understand? This workshop is offering a chance to physically dive into contemporary dance for a day. It’s a fantastic way to gain insight into a choreographer’s work and in a lighthearted and fun way, learn more about contemporary dance. By trying out the working methods of choreographer Björn Säfsten the participants gents a physical experience to use as a reference point when talking about the history and contemporary state of dance today.

Maximum 20 participants.