Marcos Morau: “Only by facing the unknown and the new can we move forward”

How did you come to know Afanador’s work, and what led you to create an entire production around it?

All of us who are fascinated by contemporary photography know Ruvén Afanador and his entire body of work. His way of composing and staging photographs is something that goes beyond photography and crosses the thin line that separates the arts in our time.

Ruvén Afanador does not “take” photographs; he builds them, he stages them.

In the world of art, everything is interconnected; everything feeds on what is opposite, different, strange, unknown. I believe it is in that fixation on the unknown and the new that I feel drawn to all his work, and this becomes the driving force behind my desire to create a stage work based on his entire vision.

From all the questions he raises in his photographs, I do not try to seek answers, but rather to continue posing absences, conflicts and tensions between the figures that inhabit each landscape.

In other interviews you have mentioned that you also do photography. What is it like to base your work on that of another photographer?

I studied photography and I am the grandson of a photographer, and although I never worked professionally in photography, it has always been very present in my work as a creator of worlds and stage director.

Recognising talent in another person is a feeling that builds and brings relief. Ruvén Afanador feels passion for photography, and relying on his photographs and his characters is a gift for my creativity and, at the same time, a responsibility: my aim is not to make a documentary work about his art, but to draw inspiration from his work in order to build another. The references, the flashes of his work within mine, must serve to dream of a world that ceases to belong to Afanador and, at the same time, dreams with him. That is the key.

What was the research phase like? Did you have any contact with Ruvén Afanador during the process?

Yes, we have spoken; he has given me his books, videos from the photo shoots and, above all, he has placed a great deal of trust in me. For now, all of that is enough to begin this journey.

What challenges have you encountered in this production? What has been the most satisfying part?

The main challenge is approaching dancers whose language I had not worked with before. I take this challenge as a virtue. Only by facing the unknown and the new can we move forward, grow and continue to feel fascinated by what we do.

You have already worked with part of the team you chose for the production of Afanador. Do you usually work with the same team, or do you look for specific collaborators depending on the production?

Building a team with which you feel safe and comfortable is something that can take a lifetime. Once you find it, it is very hard to part from it. It is beautiful to keep adding new people, young people, new sensations that coexist with those already present. Getting lost together in order to find one another again and keep building.

What is it like to move from contemporary dance to Spanish dance? Is the background of coming from contemporary dance still noticeable in Afanador?

It is noticeable, but it does not suffer. I am trying to get closer to their language rather than bring them towards mine, even if it may not seem that way. Here, balance is what matters: that they feel strong and comfortable with who they are, and that my team and I feel convinced of the agreement and pact we are establishing with them and with Ruvén Afanador.

What did you want to convey with this work, and what will audiences find in Afanador?

We are all fascinated by the world of flamenco. That happened to Afanador as a Colombian, and it happens to me as a Valencian. But the world of flamenco already exists and has its own strength and its own evolution; because we must not forget that everything changes, everything moves forward, and that change is life. Remaining still leads us to death.

That said, my starting point was to begin from Ruvén Afanador’s world and dream upon it and all its oneiric distortions: to see the world of flamenco through a distorting lens, a lens born of dreams, desire and memory.

If the elements of tradition are, by definition, reassuring, what happens if those reassuring elements become strange and unrecognisable?

What Ruvén Afanador does with flamenco is surrealist work, and it is what I myself constantly do with La Veronal. Therefore, the point from which Ruvén Afanador and I begin is the same: not to represent the world that exists, but to invent it.

Why should we go and see it?

I believe the performing arts, and the arts in general, are experiencing a great moment of hybridisation, mixture and contagion. Everything feeds on everything else, and everything grows and moves forward. The world changes, and it needs art to be there to translate it into works that speak of our time.

Afanador is a work that starts from a sacred legacy and confronts our time and its changes. It is a work of rigour, beauty and mystery: because only by mixing the past with the present can we discover and launch ourselves forward. And this is what Afanador wants: to respect the legacy, mix it with our present and launch it into the future.