Performance
Avgang 2025: Yelena Arakelow / Crocodile, I Like The Way My Nails Look At Me
The performance Crocodile, I Like The Way My Nails Look At Me is Yelena Arakelow’s graduation project in master dance at KHiO.
Crocodile, I Like The Way My Nails Look At Me
A crocodile jumps to the bathroom
A dance wrestles to be rolled
A carpet rests like a lake
A naked bicycle runs for the tram
A water bottle slips through the door
The performance "Crocodile, I Like The Way My Nails Look At Me" explores the interplay between fl ow and non-fl ow, beauty and disruption. It navigates inconvenience and playfully interrogates the act of being seen. It is a dance work driven by sweating, shaking and stretching boundaries of imagination. What occurs in an imaginative world with a crocodile resting beside a lake of joyful tears while exposing one's fl esh? "Crocodile, I Like The Way My Nails Look At Me" becomes an audacious space for experimentation – where vulnerability meets agency, and the dancing body defi es expectation. The research process of this Master in Dance project was guided by questions: What desire unfolds in juiciness? How can a fully charged movement resist momentum? What somatic and performative shifts occur when dancing when exposing fl esh? How does an experience unfold and change over time in the insistence and exhaustion of performative material?
Dance improvisation is the core of Yelena's practice which she carefully combines with video projections and dance notations in the form of choreographic notes. Yelena's work wouldn't exist without collaboration. "Crocodile, I Like The Way My Nails Look At Me" is dearly inspired by and co-worked with her friends and artists Sunniva Møen Rorvik, Nora Auerbach, Sigrid Marie Kittelsaa Vesaas, and Sólbjört Vera Ómarsdóttir. <3
For more information on Yelena and her work check out: yelenaarakelow.com
Credits
Performance - Yelena Arakelow
Dramaturgy - Nora Auerbach
External supervisor - Kristin Helgebostad
Internal supervisors - Bojana Cvejić and Torunn Helene Robstad
Sound - Ása Kolbrún Ásmundsdóttir
Lights - Eirik Lie Hegre
Costume - Signe Vasshus
Technical team at KHiO - Kjetil Skåret, Are Skaanes Engebretsen, Tormod Fuglestad and Ronnie Tungland
Stage manager - Hanna Kristine Dybfest
Special thanks to my dear classmates Antonia Harke, Emma Leah Culén Khei, Marte Brustad Melhus and Sigrid Marie Kittelsaa Vesaas as well as to Jakub Ziemann, Tormod Tora Skår Midtbø, Clarinde Wesselink, Zsuzsa Rozsavolgyi, Nikolina Pristaš, Laura Lihua Nilsen, Lóa Björk Björnsdóttir, Elisabeth C. Gmeiner, Emil Kristoff er Gustafsson and Manos Saklas.
Accessibility and trigger warnings
Partial nudity, smoke and six bean bags are available each show for more comfortable seating.
An accessibility grid including trigger warnings will follow soon.
Shows
20.03.2025 18:45
21.03.2025 18:00
22.03.2025 14:45* This is a low-intensity performance*
24.03.2025 18:00
25.03.2025 18:45
*A low-intensity performance in "Crocodile, I Like The Way My Nails Look At Me" means: reduced light and sound intensity, no use of smoke, and the show is accessible for electric wheelchairs. Six bean bags are available for more comfortable seating. ATH: Partial nudity will remain as it is a crucial part of the performance. From 13:00-13:45, there is an opportunity for a touch exploration of the stage, its props and costumes guided by Yelena Arakelow. There is no need to sign up - just show up at 13:00 at the reception at the main entrance of KHiO. A self-made audio description will be available via a QR code link before the show, but devices for listening (e.g. headphones, media player, iPods etc.) are unfortunately not provided. If you have any specifi c questions about this low-intensity performance/format please be in touch with Yelena via email to y.arakelow@gmail.com.
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