Treatment of Remembering

‘Imagine yourself breathing.’
Three performers undergo the procedure “Treatment of Remembering” along with the audience at a time when nature, consumed by humanity, no longer exists. Through poetic dance paintings, they fall into a state of remembering nature in an emptied space-time. Through the artificial imitation of the world, which has supplanted the real world, they point to the ever-increasing replacement of the natural environment with the artificial products of human activity. By awakening memories of long-forgotten experiences, the treatment of remembering procedure draws attention to the uniqueness of physical and emotional experiences connected with nature. The sensitivity of sound design and original music, along with extreme light atmospheres, enhance the intensity of sensory perception and thus complement a work that constantly vibrates with origin and extinction. Still, strong concerns emerge from the artificially created atmospheres of calm, encouraging audiences to reflect on their own relationship with the environment.

Treatment of Remembering can be presented in two versions: a white-box theatrical version and an outdoor version, in a natural environment.

Audience: adult, children 12-18

About the company

POCKETART collective is a team of creators working in the field of contemporary dance and physical theatre under the direction of choreographers Johana Pocková and Sabina Bocková. As part of its projects, the team brings together artists from the fields of dance, music, scenography, fine arts, and light design.

The team’s work is characterised by tackling topics that transcend the personal experience of the individual and touch upon societal issues such as manipulation through media, global environmental threats, stress in a competitive environment, or the position of an individual in the corporate work system. The creators try to approach these topics comprehensively, through detailed work with all theatrical elements. For each of their works, they always look for a new stylisation of physical expression unique to the topic at hand, creating dance images from specific body references. Through their distinctive poetics, visual purity and strong original music, the performances aim to give birth to a spiritual experience, compelling the audience to reflect on our society.

In 2018, the team introduced their first performance, Warehouses Full of Emotions, inspired by intergenerational views of femininity and the authentic memories of an old lady. Under the choreographic direction of Johana Pocková, four dancers collaborated on this work, as well as Pockova’s 89-year-old grandmother and an 8-year-old girl. This performance was later transformed into the dance film Folds of Touch. In 2019, POCKETART introduced Onto the Scale!, Johana Pocková’s duet with the central theme of stress in a competitive environment.

In 2019, having previously collaborated on several projects, Sabina Bocková and Johana Pocková created Lion’s Den, a duet pondering the themes of media manipulation and political populism. This work was selected for the Czech Dance Platform 2020, included in the choreographic platform AerowavesTwenty21 Top 20 and the duet was performed at the festivals TANEC PRAHA 2020 and 2021, Kenya International Theatre Festival, New Baltic Dance Festival, Malá Inventura, and the Flora festival in Olomouc.

In the subsequent years, Lion’s Den was transformed into two other projects. One of them is the outdoor performance Jáma lvová UNLIMITED, which involves 14 professional and 14 non-professional dancers, who co-create and subsequently perform choreography based on the original duet. This project was part of the festival TANEC PRAHA 2021 and was shortlisted for the European platform Big Pulse Dance Alliance. The Lion’s Den was also included in the project Shape It!, which allows artists to collaborate with children and adapt their work for young audiences. The Shape It! partners are The Place London, Comune di Bassano del Grappa, Tanec Praha, and Annantalo.

In 2020, the team premiered Treatment of Remembering, a performance created by Sabina Bocková, Johana Pocková, and Inga Zotova-Mikshina. It touches upon the topics of the global threat to the environment and the disappearance of nature from our world. This piece won the International Jury Prize and the Audience Award at Czech Dance Platform 2021, as well as being included in AerowavesTwenty22.

The latest POCKETART piece is To the Madonna with Rust, a solo performance by Johana Pocková, which was nominated for the TANEC PRAHA festival 2022.

The long-term co-production partners of POCKETART are Tanec Praha z.ú. and Ponec dance venue. The creative team is financially supported by the Ministry of Culture of the Czech Republic, the Capital City of Prague, the State Cultural Fund and City District Prague 3. POCKETART’s performances are regularly performed on Prague stages such as the dance venue Ponec, Venuše ve Švehlovce, and Studio ALTA, as well as in venues across the Czech Republic and abroad.

Sabina Bocková (*1995) is a choreographer and dancer based in Prague (Czech Republic). She studied classical and modern dance and after dancing in ballet companies for three years she decided to work as a freelance artist. In 2019, she created the duet The Lion’s Den with Johana Pocková. The performance was nominated for the 26th edition of the Czech Dance Platform and it has been selected in the Aerowaves21. This work was inspired by mass media and political populism. The same year, she created another duet in collaboration with Slovak performer Tomas Janypka, songlines: expedition 97/18, a piece which delves into the loss of a close one. In 2020, in collaboration with Johana Pocková and Inga Zotova-Mikshina, she created another full-length piece, Treatment of Remembering, which tackles the topic of environmental pollution. Treatment of Remembering won the International Jury Award and the Audience Award at the 27th edition of the Czech Dance Platform and was selected for the Aerowaves22. Her work has been supported by the Big Pulse Dance Alliance organisation and, in 2022, she will be part of Shape It!, a European project for young audiences, with the duet The Lion’s Den. She is a member of the POCKETART collective with which she produces her own creations. Alongside her own work, she has also collaborated for a long time as a performer with the Tantehorse company, the company tYhle led by choreographer Marie Gourdain and most recently with Cirk La Putyka.
Fascinated by simple and obvious body language, she transforms movement through choreographic structures while at the same time addressing topics and themes that echo social and cultural issues.

Johana Pocková (*1992) graduated from the Duncan Centre Dance Conservatory in Prague, completed a six-month internship at the Peridance Capezio Centre in New York and spent two years at the SEAD (Salzburg Experimental Academy of Dance). She is currently focused on auteur choreography. In 2017, she won the Jarmila Jerábková Award for her choreography MURDER! A little comic book history. In recent years, she has also presented the productions Why Not Now?, Na Váhu! and Warehouses Full of Emotions and the dance film Folds of Touch. Together with Sabina Bocková, she is the creator of the performance The Lion’s Den, which was selected for the Czech Dance Platform 2020, and named one of the top 20 productions on the European platform Aerowaves 2021. Her work has been supported by the Big Pulse Dance Alliance organisation and, in 2022, she will be part of Shape It!, a European project for young audiences, with the duet The Lion’s Den. Her latest work with Sabina Bocková and Inga Zotová-Mikshina, Treatment of Remembering, won the International Jury Award and the Audience Award at the 27th edition of the Czech Dance Platform and was selected for Aerowaves22. In 2019, she founded the dance association POCKETART and, in 2020, won the first Dance News Award for her contribution to the dance scene. As a performer, she collaborates with the Tantehorse and tYhle companies.
In her creations, Pocková is interested in searching for original forms of lyrical and poetic dance language combined with absurdity and irony based on current social and cultural topics. She is also interested in combining art forms such as classical singing, acting and visual arts with dance.

Inga Zotova Mikshina (*1988) comes from Siberia, Russia. She studied dance at the Dance School of St. Petersburg and the Duncan Center Prague. She is interested in performance, dance improvisation, physical theatre, visual arts and western and eastern philosophy. She collaborates as a performer with Spitfire Company, Tantehorse, Archa Theatre and others. In 2015, she received the first prize of the Jarmila Jerabkova award at the New Europe festival. She is co-founder of the artistic group Ferst Dadler, the POCKETART collective and the Guides collective, which takes part annually as a special part of the KIOSK festival in Zilina, Slovakia. She is currently taking part in the projects Treatment of Remembering (POCKETART), Byt pre Limbovu (Guides collective) and the PRIMA performance (collaboration with Viktor Černický). She studies Aesthetics in the Department of Philosophy at Charles University in Prague and practices and teaches yoga, including Yoga and Creation at the Duncan Center Prague.