German premier

One who loves is like a vampire. All or nothing, love takes its toll. There’s a reason we say: »I love you so much, I could eat you.« And, for the egoism of love, sucking the blood of the other is, like the imminence of death, a total feeling that borders sometimes on the limits of the endurable.

The piece »The Intelligence of the Heart« (in Finnish »Sydämen Äly«) from Nigel Charnock fluctuates between dance, musical, drama and show. Charnock’s English black humour blends with the coolness of the Finnish north in a most spirited manner. The performers play-act in wigs and costumes before they change into people from modern times and, always between irony and seriousness, pay tribute to the sensitivity of the heart as the fundamental energy for existence.

Born in 1961, Nigel Charnock founded the DV8 Physical Theatre in London together with Lloyd Newson in 1985. Since 1996, he’s been working with his own company. His choreographies always have something to do with sex, love, God and death. With his solo performance »Fever« (1999), which is based on Shakespeare’s love sonnets, he appeared all over Europe.

Along with the classical ballet at the opera house, the Finnish capital has the Helsinki Dance Company at the City Theatre. After previous direction from, among others, Jorma Uotinen, Carolyn Carlson and Kenneth Kvarnström, Charnock took over the artistic direction of Finland’s largest contemporary dance company in January of 2003.