Festival edition
2023
OLFA SENDESNI, KARMELE MUTUZOLA, STRELITZIA, CALISTEMON LAEVIS, NERIUM OLEANDER, POTHOS, PRUNUS LUSITANICA MYTIFOLIA, HIBISCUS SYRIACUS & FICUS ABIDJAN
MARTA GALVEZ, CLAUDIO VILLANUEVA, OLIVE TREE & CALOCEDRUS DECURRENS
Finalists
Jury
Sven Kallen
Jury
Sven Kallen has a deep love for nature, and with his foundation Life Terra, he is planting millions of trees in 20 European countries. Life Terra focuses on engaging students and communities to promote local climate action. We believe that environmental issues should be addressed comprehensively, and that art can play a very important role in connecting people and nature.
Monika Požek
Jury
Monika Požek, choreographer, teacher, and founder of the MeetShareDance Association in Madrid. She trained in hip-hop in Slovenia and contemporary dance in Buenos Aires. Starting in 2007, she began her training in inclusive dance. With extensive experience leading artistic and educational projects related to performing arts, contemporary dance, accessibility, and inclusion, she is the founder of the international dance festival MeetShareDance, held annually in a different country. The festival has had 11 editions and visited 9 countries. In 2017, it received the first EU #BeInclusive Sports Award in Brussels for being the best inclusion project. In 2018, Monika created her own dance company, MAD Kolektiv, initiating her own productions and international collaborations. In 2014, she received the Fulbright Schuman scholarship for research on best practices in inclusive dance in the United States and Europe. In 2021/2022, she was an ArtsLink Fellowship recipient in San Francisco.
Fabrice Edelmann
Jury
Fabrice Edelmann was born in Geneva, Switzerland. After his early studies at the Conservatoire Populaire, he enrolled in L’École de Danse de Genève, under the direction of Beatriz Consuelo, where he trained in classical and contemporary dance techniques. Shortly thereafter, he joined the Ballet Junior under the same director, gaining his first choreographic experiences. In 1994, he became a member of the Hagen Ballet under the direction of Richard Wherlock, where he worked as a soloist in Lucerne, at the Komische Oper in Berlin, and the Ballet Basel over a period of eight years.
In 2002, Fabrice joined Nacho Duato’s National Dance Company, expanding his repertoire with works by Duato himself, as well as pieces by Ohad Naharin, Jiri Kylian, William Forsythe, Mats Ek, and Gentian Doda. In the 2008 season, he became a rehearsal director for the National Dance Company 2, eventually taking over its direction in 2010. Currently, Fabrice balances dance projects with his role as Nacho Duato’s assistant, serving as a guest teacher in various schools, conservatories, and national and international companies, conducting repertoire workshops and teaching classical and contemporary dance classes.
In addition, he completed a master’s degree in cultural management at the Universidad Complutense de Madrid. Currently, he works as a production assistant for the “Somos Arte” gala held annually at the Palau de les Arts Reina Sofía in Valencia. He also serves as the artistic coordinator for the Teatros del Canal in Madrid.
Blanca de la Torre
Jury
Blanca de la Torre is an exhibition curator, Ph.D. in Fine Arts, art historian, and researcher whose work is situated at the intersection of visual arts, political ecology, and sustainable creative practices. Currently, she serves as the Chief Curator of the Helsinki Biennial.
She was the Chief Curator of the 15th International Biennial of Cuenca, Ecuador, and the artistic co-director of the Overview Effect Project at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Belgrade, as well as “Con los pies en la T(t)ierra” at the CAAM, Atlantic Center for Modern Art, where she also directs the Sustainable Classroom. She has curated exhibitions for the Network of Cultural Centers of the AECID in various Latin American locations, implementing sustainability guidelines to reduce ecological impact.
From 2009 to 2014, she was a curator, conservator, and head of exhibitions and projects at ARTIUM, the Basque Museum-Center of Contemporary Art (Vitoria-Gasteiz, Spain).
Subsequently, she curated exhibitions at international museums and art centers, including MoCAB, Museum of Contemporary Art in Belgrade, Serbia; Salzburger Kunstverein, Salzburg, Austria; EFA, Elisabeth Foundation Project Space, New York; Centro de las Artes de Monterrey, Mexico; Museo Carrillo Gil in Mexico City; Museo de Arte Contemporáneo de Oaxaca, Mexico; Museo de Arte Contemporáneo Ex Convento del Carmen Guadalajara; Museo de Arte Contemporáneo de Ciudad Juárez, Mexico; Museo de Arte Contemporáneo de Sonora, Mexico; NC-Arte, Bogotá, Colombia; RAER, Real Academia de España en Roma, Italy; LAZNIA Center for Contemporary Art, Gdansk, Poland; Sala Alcalá 31, Madrid; CentroCentro, Madrid; Fernán Gómez, Madrid; NGMA, National Gallery of Modern Art, New Delhi, India; MUSAC, Museum of Contemporary Art of Castilla y León, 516 Contemporary Arts Museum in Albuquerque, USA, among others.
Always approaching her work with a focus on eco-aesthetics and political ecology, and viewing art as an instrument of knowledge to rethink and reformulate our way of life, she has also published over a hundred specialized texts in books, catalogs, and magazines. She regularly participates in international conferences and symposia on culture and sustainability.
Jean-Philippe Dury
Jury
Jean-Philippe Dury is the artistic leader of ELEPHANT IN THE BLACK BOX from its inception. Dury possesses an insatiable creative drive, a desire to share his artistic vision with the world, and the responsibility to meet the international demand from programmers and directors. His choreographic hallmarks are elegance and artistic quality in staging, along with a special sensitivity to the themes he addresses as a creator. This identity reflects his artistic and professional journey.
Dury has danced for renowned international companies such as the Paris Opera Ballet, the Ballets de Monte-Carlo, the National Dance Company in Madrid, and as a guest artist with Les Grands Ballets de Montreal. In these companies, he has built a career distinguished by the versatility of the repertoire, spanning from grand classical ballets to contemporary works by leading choreographers of the 20th and 21st centuries.
Beyond performing, Dury has created works for companies like Leipzig Opera Ballet, Basel Ballet, and Ilicite Company. He has also produced his own pieces for the EBB company, amassing over 20 works and earning awards such as Talent Madrid in 2013, Taglioni European Ballet Awards in Berlin in 2014, and the UNESCO Simon Bolivar Award for Best Career. Since 2016, he has taken on a new mission focused on emerging international dancers, aiming to promote and develop their artistic careers.
In addition, Dury is frequently invited by numerous international schools as a teacher and choreographer to share his artistic knowledge with dance students.