When Bach enters a cage: the project from Inca that is gaining international resonance
Born at the Principal theatre of the capital of the Raiguer as a laboratory between music, space, image and movement, ‘Gàbia’ has passed through Barcelona, and now has been selected for the Prague Quadrennial, the great world event of current scenography
PalmaThere are projects that are born designed to reach a result and others that are born, precisely, to never have a definitive form. Gàbia belongs to the latter. The Principal Theatre of Inca placed the six Cello Suites by Johann Sebastian Bach inside a cube, placed cellist Miquel Àngel Aguiló there and began to invite artists to inhabit that space and transform it. Music, dance, circus, graffiti, visual arts, video and movement have been entering and exiting a structure that functions simultaneously as a scenography, limit, refuge and exhibition space.
The result is a project that is difficult to categorize, built from Inca and which has progressively begun to spark interest outside of Mallorca. After being presented at the Principal in Inca, Gàbia continued its journey in Barcelona, with performances at DAU al Sec and echoes in different media. Now a recognition of another dimension arrives: it has been selected to participate in the Prague Quadrennial of Performance Design and Space 2027, one of the main international gatherings dedicated to scenography and research on performative space.
The selection matters, but above all because it confirms a trajectory. A scenic research project born in a municipal theatre in Inca has managed to enter circuits where the future of scenography and contemporary performing arts is considered.
Bach as a backbone
At the center of Gàbia there is a work with almost three centuries of history. Miquel Àngel Aguiló performs the six Suites for solo cello by Bach in their entirety and live. But, far from a conventional concert performance, the music functions as the temporal skeleton upon which everything else is built.
Around Aguiló is the cube. A square within another square that alters the traditional relationship between performer and spectator. The proximity is extreme. Whoever watches is no longer protected by the habitual distance of an auditorium, and whoever performs is subjected to an almost physical exposure before the audience.
This tension is part of the work. Gàbia can be a place of extreme intimacy and at the same time a space of absolute vulnerability. Since it was born, nine artists from different disciplines have passed through the device. And each one has modified the project. It is not simply a matter of different performers doing the same piece: each intervention establishes a new relationship with Bach, with the body, with the image, with the architecture of the cube, and with the spectators.
This is probably one of the reasons why the project maintains the capacity to grow. Gàbia is not so much a show as a structure prepared for things to happen in it.
A work that does not want to remain closed
Under the artistic direction of Miquel Àngel Raió, managing director of the Teatre Principal d’Inca, the project was conceived from the beginning as a scenic investigation rather than a finished piece.
Music does not accompany the dance, nor does the video illustrate the music, nor does the space serve simply as a backdrop. All these elements share hierarchy and mutually condition one another. The cube forces the creators to rethink movement; Bach imposes a tempo; the images transform the perception of space and the close presence of the audience inevitably modifies the performance.
The project, developed with the support of the National Institute of Performing Arts and Music (INAEM), is part of a line that the Principal d’Inca has sought to reinforce in recent years: that the theatre should not solely be a place to receive shows created elsewhere, but also a place to create, investigate, and take risks.
“Gàbia was born precisely from the desire to understand the theatre not only as a space for exhibition, but also as a place to investigate, take risks, and generate new languages,” explains Raió.
That this commitment is now reaching an international platform gives another dimension to that decision. The Prague Quadrennial, created in 1967 and held every four years, will bring together creators, institutions, professionals, and schools from dozens of countries in Prague between June 8 and 17, 2027. Thus, Gàbia will be part of the PQ Performance Space, one of the sections specifically dedicated to thinking about how the performance space is constructed and transformed.
The new international life of Gàbia also poses a challenge that is very consistent with the original spirit of the project: the show will not be performed in Prague. The selection is in an exhibition format, and this forces the Principal d’Inca team to do something that, in reality, fits perfectly with a work conceived to transform itself: to reimagine it.
“The fact that we are not presenting the performance in Prague, but rather its transformation into an exhibition proposal, is of particular interest to us,” explains Raió. “It forces us to rethink the project: what remains of a scenic experience when the performers disappear? How can we convey a space, a proximity, a sound, or a sensation through an exhibition?”
The theater is now working with different possibilities. A scale model of the original device, large-format photography, projections, sound, and spatial elements could be part of the proposal. The goal is not to build a display case that explains what Gàbia was, but rather to try to have the visitor experience something of it.