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Putting a jolt in flamenco

Von Magnet brings its electric style of performance theater to the island
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By Darrell Jónsson
For The Prague Post
July 25th, 2007 issue

COURTESY PHOTO
Latin dance goes Goth in the troupe's unpredictable mix of music and theater.
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Von Magnet

When: Thursday, July 26, at 8
Where: Střelecký ostrov
Tickets: 200 Kč, available through Ticketstream and at the venue

“Some young people seem happy to discover a daring, futuristic Gothic translation of flamenco, while other people are maybe shocked by the liberties we take with our use of the purest forms of flamenco,” says percussionist, vocalist, dancer and Von Magnet co-founder Phil Von. The “liberties” he refers to include Von Magnet’s blend of an electro-industrial legacy with the more animistic threads of European and Asian 20th-century performance art and theater.  
It’s clear that a few shocked people in the audience have not inhibited Von Magnet’s artistic freedom on 2005’s De L’Aimant (released on the Fairplay Label), where they take flamenco variations of rumba, siguirya and buleria on a journey through post-industrial electronics. What separates its efforts from similar ethno-electro hackers such as Deep Forest, Enigma and B-Tribe is Von Magnet’s embrace of the full potential of the stage and physical movement. This choreographic element can sometimes be aggressive. Yet even with Von Magnet’s roots in London’s seminal 1980s industrial music scene, it often achieves a result as lyrical as the human form itself.
“In London in the early ’80s, we were struck by the post-industrial performance pieces elaborated by groups like Test Department, a very powerful mix of scrap-metal percussion, electronics, visual arts and guests dancers performed in old warehouses,” says Von, who is now based in France. “The work of our agents NL Centrum [who also represent Test Department, Survival Laboratories Research, Laibach, Zev, Einstürzende Neubauten and Etants Donnés] was a great kick for us in always experiencing newer ways to perform. More than conventional street theater, Von Magnet has grown using challenging, odd, site-specific venues such as disused factories, hospitals, churches, slaughterhouses and [martial arts] dojos, with an originality coming from the flamenco element.”
For its 1989 debut studio work, El Sexo Surrealista (on the Prikosnovénie label), Von Magnet secured the services of producer Ken Thomas, known for his work with Psychic TV, Wire and the Sugarcubes. In celebration of the group’s 10th CD, the innate trance-hop potential of Von Magnet was finally explored by DJ and composer Holeg on Spies Under Von Magnet Influence–Suvmi (on the Celestial Dragon label).
Despite this worthy tribute, Von Magnet touches the techno-disco-ambient dance floor only lightly, instead seeking depth charges gathered from trends in avant-garde 20th-century art. Many of these influences Von attributes to the group’s co-founder, Flore Magnet.
“Her theatrical studies were partly dealing with Grotowski, Kantor, the Living Theatre, Pina Bausch and the Fluxus activists,” he says. “She brought that knowledge within our musical work and helped us to channel charisma and become performance artists. We were, in those times, merely musicians, with a lot of ambition to challenge the stage and its boundaries.  
“The first trigger we encountered was the Lindsay Kemp Company performing Jean Genet’s Flowers in London, a crazy mixture of mime, dance, cabaret, Japanese percussion, singing, theater and blood. From that moment on, we knew we would blend all art forms to create our own multidisciplinary form. The early Von Magnet formation in 1989 was composed of two people from art school, two theater people, two musicians and two members of a flamenco pena.”
Now, as the new millennium begins to unfold, Von Magnet’s mixture doesn’t sound all that crazy, especially compared to the similar atomic reactions of 20th-century Japanese Butoh artists. In that context, Von Magnet’s work seems timely if not overdue. The merging of impulses from electronica, flamenco and Butoh is put in a framework of what Von describes as “dealing with the notion of ‘state of being’ rather than the fact of ‘acting,’ somewhere in between trance and control.”
Prague’s Open-Air Cinema stage on Střelecký Island should provide Von Magnet with enough site-specific magic for its current work, which Von describes as “a musical drama where bodies as well as souls seek ways of escape.”  
Von Magnet’s flamenco-flavored hybrid should resonate nicely with Carlos Saura’s film that will be shown after the performance, 1984’s Carmen. The liberties Saura took in setting Bizet’s opera on Andalusian earth, with musical help from Paco De Lucia, rattled a flamenco purist cage or two when it first appeared. These days, the film is often referenced as a media event that brought flamenco to a wider audience.

Darrell Jónsson can be reached at features@praguepost.com


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