No music but bags of rhythm: Carte Blanche in Cancel Bertha at the Bergen International Festival

Studio Bergen, Bergen, Norway
May 31, 2025

Carte Blanche’s performance of a new work is inevitably the dance highlight of the Bergen International Festival. This year, Norway’s national company for contemporary dance invited the sought-after Belgian choreographer Jan Martens to work with them. His Cancel Bertha is unusual in that there is almost no musical accompaniment. But that doesn’t mean silence, because it still comes loaded with sound and rhythm, and is full of life.

Music, in whatever form, has a close association with dance. Indeed, it is often seen as an inseparable bedfellow. But it is sometimes problematic. While music can be invaluable in inspiring, guiding or supporting choreography, it can also overpower it. It can colour perceptions in unintended ways and, as Martens says, it can just be a safety net. If Cancel Bertha is anything to go by, given the right circumstances, taking it away can help reveal things in the dance that might otherwise be missed.

The audience is greeted by a designer Joris van Oosterwijk’s stripped back stage, although the floor is covered by a large plastic sheet with chequered pink-green patterning, surrounded by yellow, and with a huge picture of a sleeping dog at its centre. But while the design plays an important role in helping the dancers space themselves, it feels warming and welcoming rather than functional.

The fourteen dancers enter hesitantly alone, or in twos or threes. They look at the audience. The silence is striking but the occasion smile or nod of acknowledgement establishes connection immediately. Designer Indrani Balgobin dresses everyone differently: a biketard, pyjamas, a skirt and top, a polo shirt and pants, a martial arts uniform and so on. Common is that all are in silver, and all have the Carte Blanche logo worked into them, however.

Brief sequences of movement, all also very individual, are repeated. As the peculiarly poetic scene develops, it’s natural to look for clues. Brecht Bovijn, who enters with an unexpected gymnastic dive forward roll, is clearly strumming an air guitar. Iris Auguste, in a martial arts uniform, is definitely blocking and punching. But is Adrian Bartczak ballroom dancing with an imaginary partner? Why? And does it matter anyway?

At first glance, it looks chaotic. In fact, it is anything but. While each dancer may have their own sequence, it quickly becomes apparent that there is a common rhythm to it all as the dancers’ movements become the soundscape. Feet thud on the floor, Hands beat against bodies and costumes. As a note in the programme said, “Music isn’t always what you hear, it’s what you see and feel.” But always, always, just as important is the silence.

It quickly becomes apparent there is a lot of counting. It feels a little like a mathematical puzzle and an exercise in geometry. Indeed, one moment in a film made during the creative process shows Martens standing next to a flip chart full of numbers. As movements are repeated, turned and facings changed, everyone was spot on. Moments of order sometimes appear. Abstract moments suddenly turn into concrete situations, but then dissolve just as swiftly.

Then, just when you think you might be starting to work Cancel Bertha out, Martens springs a surprise, and the dancers disappear. When they return, it’s as if what follows deconstructs all that has gone before.

To a metronomic tapping sound, unison duets and trios start to appear as phrases are ‘borrowed’ between performers. There is also a moment when you suddenly realise everyone is moving anti-clockwise, as if in some sort of vortex. A prolonged strobe light feels unnecessary, however.

Despite the lack of obvious direction, the interest never flags. There is simply too much going on, so much detail. Curious things happen that make you wonder. Why does Dawid Lorenc sit out upstage right for a long time, one hand over his eyes, the other raised as if wanting to ask a question, for example.

Cancel Bertha is a fascinating creation that poses many questions about choreographic structure and the relationship between dance and music. It’s certainly bold in its approach. Brave, even. But what really makes the piece work are the dancers. Playful yet precise, they all perform terrifically. The work comes with a lot of lightness and several splashes of humour. Despite the unique vocabulary of each, the dancers cohabit the space easily. We do see them as individuals but also very much part of a group, a community, society. It is very, very human.

When music is finally heard, in the shape of recurring snatches from ‘Tonight’ by Sibylle Baier, the silence elsewhere makes it feels very important. The rhythm of the song fits that of the movement perfectly. Associations between lyrics and movements seen at the time and previously start to be made.

But what of the title? Who was Bertha and why did she need cancelling? If you haven’t spotted it, Cancel Bertha is an anagram of Carte Blanche, which brings us back to deconstructing and reconstructing. Indeed, Martens has said that he wanted to “reconfigure the dancers (i.e. the letters) of the company in a new constellation, that would both showcase their individuality and their excellence as a well-functioning ensemble.” He succeeds.

Established in Bergen in 1989, Carte Blanche is the Norwegian national company for contemporary dance. Although presently located at Studio Bergen, which houses its production facilities and home stage, in 2027 it is due to due to move into the redeveloped Sentralbadet Scenekunsthus, a former municipal swimming pool that is being transformed into a state-of-the-art performing arts venue with multiple stages, production facilities, and spaces to accommodate both local and international productions. Carte Blanche will share their new home with BIT Teatergarasjen, a company that co-produces and presents Norwegian and international performing arts.

Although it tours in Norway and internationally, Carte Blanche has never performed in the UK. One has to wonder why. Surely it cannot be too much longer before someone invites them.

More on the Bergen International Festival soon.