Mats Ek

Mats Ek is one of the leading personalities of 20th century choreography. With his radical reinterpretation of the ballet classic Giselle for the Cullberg Ballet, the company that his mother Birgit Cullberg founded in NN, he caused widespread international resonance in 1982 because no one had previously dared to change the original choreographic text and the form of the libretto. In this version, critics and audience recognized the beginning of a new era of theatrical dance. »My choreographies are underlaid with a subtext: if you dance them, you have to connect certain images and feelings with the movement. Without them the movements just appear strange and peculiar. The focus always has to be clear: for a solo, it’s directed to the interior of the person, for several dancers it’s related to the partners,« as Mats Ek himself described the attitude being necessary to perform his choreographies.