16th Dance Days Chania
L. Heilbron & A. Givanovitch «Violent Delights»
Ocram dance movement / G. Gheller «Love Parade»

16th Dance Days Chania
International contemporary dance festival

Tuesday July 21st 2026
"Mikis Theodorakis" theatre

Luisa Heilbron & Andrea Givanovitch
«Violent Delights»
(Austria/ France/ Brazil)

Start Time: 21:30

Violent Delights is a contemporary dance duet inspired by the complex entanglement of time, human relationships, and the intensity of fleeting passions. Taking its title from Shakespeare's famous line "these violent delights have violent ends" the piece explores how love and conflict, like time itself, are both inevitable and inescapable.

At its core lies the question of legacy, what remains after the storm of emotion has passed. The duet examines how our gestures, affections, and struggles echo through time, leaving invisible imprints on the body and the people we touch. Each movement becomes a trace, a fragment of memory that lingers even as it dissolves. The dancers engage in a subtle physical dialogue, where fluidity meets sharpness, and moments of tenderness suddenly erupt into bursts of energy. The choreography weaves together unity and discord, reflecting the tension between desire and destruction that often defines intense relationships. Time, in this duet, acts both as an unrelenting force and a fragile instant a ticking clock, illustrated through the use of light, that binds and tears apart the two moving bodies.

From the very first moments, a rush of sensations, gestures, and sounds floods the space; the performers intertwine their bodies in a frantic race against disappearance. Through dynamic shifts, the duet captures this simultaneous motion of union and separation, guided by a constantly evolving temporal landscape, at times flowing with it, at others resisting it.

As the piece unfolds, time stretches and slows down, revealing a delicate precision born from suspension, offering the viewer the subtlety that emerges from this relationship. Built upon intricate movement patterns and complex rhythms, Violent Delights demands intense physical commitment through elaborate partner work. The dramaturgy unfolds solely through movement, supported by an evocative sound design. The audience is drawn into an urgent physical dialogue where passion, memory, and loss coexist, a living archive of emotion, a legacy of bodies in motion that continues to resonate long after the dance ends.

Choreographed and performed by: Luisa Heilbron & Andrea Givanovitch
Music: Raul Aranha, Roli Gezcy
Music production: Victor Saiz, Julian Meindl
Video and Photos: Antoine Raboud
Video editing: Luisa Heilbron, Andrea Givanovitch
Residency: SEAD Salzburg

Supported by the Austrian Embassy in Athens.

Ocram dance movement / Glenda Gheller
«Love Parade»
(Italy)
Starting time 22:00

"Everything we seek can only be found in the present"
"Love empowers us to live fully and die well"
"To believe that to be too celebratory is dangerous"
"All about Love: New Visons"

bell hooks

Imagine a parade, not of allegorical floats, but visions, a procession that winds through introspective spaces where love reveals itself in all its honest complexity.

A silent exchange begins between two bodies, connected by the shadows of the past and an intangible future, they are striving to dialogue, fully embracing just that present moment.

The parade reveals love amidst the fragility of existence. Love and loss are constantly intertwined, moving like two directly proportional forces. Everything becomes a delicate balance between an embrace and a farewell.

Love spreads: a chaotic multitude of voices merges into a single chant, an anthem of diversity and inclusion.

A powerful whirlwind of movement becomes a liberating, wholehearted cry for universal love.

Love Parade reflects, in its present, the battles of the past.

From the ballroom culture of 1980s New York, where queer minorities competed in catwalk battles to celebrate their identity and artistic expression, to the Love Parades festivals of 1990s Berlin, where rhythm and movement were acts of manifestation for peace, unity, and love without labels and restrictions.

Inspired by the provocative reflections of bell hooks, Love Parade also looks with hope to the future,

inviting us to speak of real love, without veils and idealizations. It all begins with "Why are we still afraid to talk about love?" and continues with the desire to encourage this feeling, which remains at the core of human existence.

Idea and choreography: Glenda Gheller
Performance: Pietro Di Salvo, Nunzio Saporito
Dramaturgy: Glenda Gheller with the collaboration of Sergio Campisi
Production: ocram dance movement in collaboration with Scenario Pubblico Centro di Rilevante Interesse Nazionale
Original music: Michele Piccolo and Massimo Lievore
Costume consultancy: Adriano Popolo Rubbio
Costume creation: Gabriella Palomba

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