La Jornada: Inclusive dance reflects on the paths of life

The dance work Enigmaperformed by the FUGA Dance Company for Groups with Mixed Abilities, made up of 12 professional dancers, some with different abilities, was created as a profound musical and life search. The piece will be presented today in the Lázaro Cárdenas square of the Jaime Torres Bodet Cultural Center of the National Polytechnic Institute (IPN) to celebrate International Dance Day.

The playwright and director of the company, Leticia Peñaloza, explained to The Day the challenges of finding spaces for work and financial support: “we started in 2003, we are pioneers in these inclusion processes. All the dancers who participate in this project are professionals, only some of them have a disability and our vision is to break the paradigm that the dancers’ bodies are perfect. It is a long path that leads us to continue learning as a company to bond and have empathy among all our members. It is an effort of great will and passion,” he assured.

The short choreography Enigma It is an exercise in deep search, born from a musical foray by Peñaloza. “This piece is a reflection on the paths we travel in life, we always discover something, even if it is not what we want. It is a strong lesson because during this journey many people are left behind; so we want to analyze what happens with what we assume we have overcome and the encounters with new people.

“In this case our dialogue is like a ship leaving a port. The way we work is always transformed, every time we represent a piece, they are the co-creators, our dancers rotate their positions, so we can see two dancers in a wheelchair who combine their movements with two who have other conditions and it is a mixture that forces us to adapt.”

Constant struggle and challenges

For Leticia Peñaloza, inclusion is a movement of struggle and sustainability of projects. According to the choreographer, the company has had to face the lack of spaces, dancers and financing: “it is a constant challenge and it has paid off, some of our works and works have been taken up by institutions in other countries such as the United States or England, to name a few, and we have even gone on exchange.”

Among the projects in which the company has participated are Escape, Enigma Code, Winds, Medusa, Zigzag, Parallel world, Crossing, Utopia, a new day, Links, Wanderings, Finding My Way y So.

“We want to take advantage of the use of dance, its total functionality of the body. To be able to understand ourselves as individuals in our movement. Enigma We have worked on it with quintets or quartets and I think I would love for the public to be able to see that anyone has desires, desires, searches, and the changes that are going to happen, whether they want one or not,” he concluded.

The staging Enigma It is presented today at 12:20 in the Plaza Lázaro Cárdenas of the Jaime Torres Bodet Cultural Center, located on Avenida Wilfrido Massieu s/n, almost on the corner of Avenida Politécnico, in the Zacatenco neighborhood, Gustavo A. Madero mayor’s office. Free entry.