In a different realm: BORDA by Lia Rodrigues Companhia de Danças

Muffathalle, Munich
June 16, 2025

Following its premiere at the Kunstenfestivaldesarts in Brussels in May, Brazilian choreographer Lia Rodrigues and her Companhia de Danças presented BORDA in Muffathalle in Munich in June. The venue, part of the independent, cultural institution Muffatwerk, presents concerts, theatre, dance and literature. BORDA was a coproduction with Kunstenfestivaldesarts and other festivals and venues in Europe.

Rodrigues is famed for her efforts in the favela of Maré, one of the biggest slums in Rio de Janeiro. She was instrumental in establishing the Maré Arts Center in 2009, and a fee-free dance school and dancing space in 2011. With her company she organizes outreach programs. Her pieces are renowned for taking up current political themes and for dealing with human relationships, and are characterised by strong imagery.

The playbill explained that BORDA means border, edge, barrier and threshold in Portuguese, and that the piece is about: crossing borders, who belongs inside or out, what divides us geographically and politically, and who has the right to exist. The problem with texts that so explicitly state the content of works is that they create expectations which, when not met in any way, leave you feeling somewhat frustrated. In this case, no text would have been a better option, because the piece lived on its own.

We are so used to dance being movement in space to mostly loud music that it at first felt awkward but also exiting when the piece started in complete silence and almost blackness. All you could see was a white low mound. Slowly, something grew in the middle, which turned out to be the back of a man rising. It felt as if it took ten minutes, but maybe it was less, maybe more. Without music and an almost indiscernibly action, I lost track of time and, and a strong feeling of curiosity as to what would happen next arose.

The whole mound started to move and the faces of the nine dancers appeared in between the white. They wormed around like one organic, connected organism. Sometimes you saw a whole person, sometimes just a fragment. They slowly mutated into forms briefly frozen in a tableau before they changed. Quietly, the dancers sang and talked in various languages.

Their basic outfit was a long tunic, white pants and a turban-like headgear. At times these became invisible in the white material of the mound, and at times the white material created shapes, for example of a wonderful, opulent renaissance dress. About a third of the way into the performance, the dancers were quiet, and all you heard was the rustling of plastic, while they rolled out a wide and long lane of plastic in a circle, the performers moving as if in heavy seas, creating an association with boat refugees.

Eventually the white mass converged into a mountain-like shape from which black plastic erupted like a stream of lava spreading at the mountain’s foot. In this moving black mass, the dancers on their knees shed their garb, and a new group of people emerged, dressed in colorful costumes decorated with a lot of sequins.

With glee and exuberance, they embarked on what seemed like a ritual kind of dance to a beautiful song by women. The evening’s first music, although and unfortunately, not listed in the program. Compared to the group in white, who seemed to be suffering or in agony, this group was a rambunctious one. In solos, duos and groups they took over the whole space. As they stomped and jumped, their movements defied all western, traditional dance forms.

At times they created special creatures. A man held up a skirt like a tutu raised at the back. Other dancers were hidden behind it, so that he looked like something walking with ten legs. Another time, the nine dancers moved forward on a line. While five faced the audience, the others walked backwards while exposing their bare butts for no apparent reason.

BORDA is a very interesting piece revealing two completely different worlds, a white slow moving one full of pain and a colorful fast moving one full of joy. But contrary to the program text, both groups seemed very homogenous, each in sync with the premise of its own world. Their use of mounds of cloth, and white and black plastic, created fascinating images open to interpretation. But what mostly got to me were the long stretches with no sound, neither from the dancers, nor the audience. It created an unexpected awareness of what was going on and anticipation of what was to come, and it changed the perception of time. It became irrelevant. At the beginning I thought, I would be bored, but the contrary was the case.