Social Animal: Where Utopia Is Possible
In a world of constant tension, where fractures are as visible as the yearnings for justice and reconciliation, dance opens a space for us to practice new forms of coexistence and listening. Through movement, we explore the possibility of a collective bodily utopia capable of imagining other ways of living together, even where the wound seems irreconcilable.
To traverse. To breathe. To yield, but also to resist.
To surrender to the inertia of the global, of a cellular ensemble that pulsates in a single heartbeat.
To rediscover oneself through the group.
To follow the fabric hidden beneath.
To be a stole that touches earth and air, to embrace the support of the other.
To share the air, despite the invisible borders that surround us.
We are in relationship. This is the necessary utopia Spinoza referred to. Bodies show, in movement, that they can leave violence behind and breathe collectively, despite their differences. Or perhaps coexist with conflict as a habitable space: a place of reflection and discovery, a shared territory where the other invites us to explore new ways of belonging.
The possible utopia is the animal that, despite its hostile exterior, persists. It embraces life, shifts its position to seek the love of its neighbor, the caress and fully human recognition. This social animal roars. It bears its wounds—those that span generations and lands—but is transformed in contact with the fissures of others. Separated from its origin, it dances toward interdependence. And, at the heart of the struggle, it recognizes itself in those who are similar and different, it repairs itself lightly in an endless dance that returns, again and again, to the place of transformation.
Bodies choreograph imaginaries and embrace new possible places. Walking toward this utopia is a political act, especially in a world marked by separation and resistance. The dancers expose both the automatisms and the possibilities of new forms of relationship, traversing spaces of pleasure, curiosity, joy, and radical empathy, but also of contradiction, discomfort, and tension. Overcoming conflict without being harmed is a desirable utopia.
Social animal, the latest dance piece by the company Col·lectiu 14, is a performance proposal that emerges from the need to place the body at the center of the debate on coexistence, vulnerability, and resistance. It is the story of a drive that swings between the tender impulse that touches the skin and the desire for recognition from one's equal. A support network, falls sustained by those who also fall alongside. Bodies that resonate with the body of the great life, being, with no other pretensions than to perpetuate themselves.
The work is an interdisciplinary project driven by the Manacor-born dancer and choreographer Bàrbara Riera, co-created with a team made up of eleven dancers, a sound creator who constructs a living and porous acoustic landscape, and a visual illustrator who translates the ephemeral nature of the collaborative artistic ecosystem movement.
The creation takes shape from a long process of collective research, in which improvisation, listening, and the tension between bodies have been creative tools. Halfway between scripted choreography and open experimentation, the piece offers a space where movement becomes an emotional and social language. There is no linear narrative, but rather a succession of situations, impulses, and gestures that, like a living organism, transform and mutate according to the connection between performers and audience.
The stage device, simple but suggestive, invites a horizontal and close encounter. There is no raised stage or fourth wall, but a shared territory where anything can happen. The spectator is not only a witness, but also a participant in an experience that appeals to the gaze, but above all, to deep perception and sensitivity. Sound, light, and silence also become bodies on stage.
Social animal It explores the relationship between the individual and the collective, between the strength of the pack and the fragility of the individual. It poses questions that don't want to be resolved but inhabited: can we find more generous ways of living together? Can we make conflict a space for growth, not separation? What happens when we stop defending our position and start listening with our bodies?
The social animal, with the pack, gains strength and knowledge, observes outside what it is like inside, and realizes both loss and encounter. Between dance and improvisation, the work doesn't find answers, but rather traces vital paths to explore the balance between belonging and singular expression. Conflict here is an opportunity to navigate divergences without getting lost. Because we are in a relationship. And this is, still, a possible—and necessary—utopia.