Interview with Israel Galván

Interview: Sara Arguijo
Photos: Ana Palma

On International Dance Day, we're speaking with Israel Galván, the only flamenco artist chosen to write the official message.

“I feel like a monk”

In order to do this interview, we decided to forget about the many adjectives that have already been used to define Israel Galván and his dancing.  To forget the shows of his we’ve seen throughout his career, the critics who chalked him off as a madman at the beginning, and now hail him as a genius.  We even forgot about the conversation held years ago when the questions revolved around the audiences that would leave their seats upon seeing him.

Even with the risk that this interview might not be so commercial, and sacrificing the journalist’s ego, we’ve sought out the simplest questions. Those which, without realizing it, take off from the advice the dancer himself gives for any creative process: “in order to evolve, it is necessary to maintain the vision of a child” he says.

Mission accomplished.  We hung up the phone after a half-hour chat, and there had not been one word about the critics, nor how much he owes to Pedro G. Romero for his success, nor the differences with his father, a defender of the most classic flamenco concepts.  These lines only seek to delve into the vision of the only flamenco artist chosen to write the message for International Dance Day celebrated Wednesday, April 29th.  To discover his obsessions, his quirks and his desires.  To listen to his improvised reflections that end up as dogma from the sincerity contained therein.  That when he dances, he only listens to his uncles who are reading Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, or that he can’t bear it when people say “break a leg!” If you want to know what goes through the mind of one of the most enigmatic, admirable and misunderstood dancers, start reading…

What does it mean to you to deliver the official message of International Dance Day?

It’s a tremendous responsibility, because it’s about dance, above and beyond whether or not it’s flamenco.  Dance is putting our bodies in movement, and in this sense we all feel the same energy.  Everyone who dances, be it break-dance, classic or sevillanas at the fair, is communicating, and this is important.

Israel Galván’s message for International Dance Day

What power does dance have over you?

Besides being a way of life, dancing has helped me overcome many fears.  With time I’ve come to realize that artists have the power to make others happy, and so we have the obligation to transmit that magic.  Art is a way of escaping from reality, and I think dance is a kind of medicine.

 “When I dance alone, without music, I feel I can be useful”

 Do you pay a price for this?

Well, a certain amount of masochism is involved, but if you dance, it’s because you’re happy with what you do, if not it would show, and you’d end up leaving it.  In my case, it becomes a necessity.  If I’m on vacation for example, I can’t go more than a week without dancing. I feel like a monk, living outside of life in a continuous process of searching, between what your mind is telling you in that moment, and the body.  But it’s a natural process, you don’t realize what you’re giving up.

To carry out that quest is it necessary to be unsatisfied or be a non-conformist?

No, I never feel dance as a struggle.  In actual fact, my body makes me be forever young, and in this sense there is, like I said, a facing-off of energy between the physical and the spiritual.  This is the only thing I come up against.

“In order to create and evolve in the art, you have to be playful and have a clear vision”

And where does Israel Galván’s creativity come from?

I take inspiration from the people who surround me.  And of course, all the information available through Google.  The important thing is to be open.  To evolve in art you have to be wide awake, maintain a clear vision, as if you were a child.  You have to play, because by playing you discover many things.  In order to create you have to observe everything, not let your ego get in the way nor become concerned about what is and is not commercial.

Nevertheless, your last two shows, ‘Fla.co.men’ y ‘Torobaka’, have been very successful.  Do you think it’s possible there’s an audience that will like anything you do?

I have an audience that appreciates what I do, but that’s no guarantee, if something is poorly done, it shows.  I’m aware there are bad days and good days.  I don’t aim to be liked at all times.

But in a certain sense, you’ve become a guru for the intellectuals, and you even include references in your work…are you a “hipster” dancer?

Yes, I suppose when you dance you put yourself in a certain vista, or in the psyche of a certain audience, but this is not necessarily the intent.  Mostly because I travel all over the world, and in each country you have spectators with a distinct culture, and you have to communicate with them all the same.  For this reason I seek that which is universal, always from the standpoint of my art, which is flamenco.

“I couldn’t stand to waste my energy doing what people expect of me”

So do you have to make a break with your audience to continue evolving?
 
Yes, I’m not one of these people who follows a certain line because it works.  I don’t want to end up being a slave of what I am.  I like to take risks.  If I get an idea, I carry it out.  Even if it’s outside the market norm, I take on concepts that don’t go down well, that depart from flamenco, that come too close, or that appear strange.  What you want to do, is in response to your own life,and for me it’s fundamental to sustain that truthfulness with myself.  I couldn’t stand to waste time and energy doing only that which the audience enjoys, or what is expected of me at the professional level.

Has the use of humor given you more freedom on stage?

Yes, in a certain sense.  In my recent work there is a freer atmosphere.  I realized that in my earlier creations death had always been an important element, which made for a corrosive climate, and this is gone.  Now I dance for the sheer pleasure of dancing, freeing myself from codes and labels.  If you start adding elements to a show in order to make everyone happy, it’s probably going to be more marketable, but you’re sacrificing sincerity.

What do you hear when you dance to silence?

When I dance without music is when I feel the most liberated.  I’m not bound to any rhythm, and I can let myself be carried away by a virtual rhythmic world in which I hear my uncles, or Belmonte, an animal, water…or I feel like I’m flying.  I’m very timid, and it’s in these moments when I detect true communication with the audience.  That is when I feel I can be useful.

Of all the adjectives that have been applied to you, which one do you prefer?

What Morente told me, that I was the oldest dancer of all the young ones.  Enrique was very special for me, a singer I seek from inside, because he was able to fly with his voice.

His sentence “I like flamenco if it comes with culture and knowledge; if it’s with ignorance, stupidity and charlatans, it doesn’t interest me” has nearly become a revolutionary catch-phrase.  What flamenco is Galván interested in?

In a word: flamenco which is free.

 “The corrosive atmosphere of my earlier work is gone”

 Have you any new projects?

 Yes, I have something in mind, but no date yet.  It’s going to represent a dramatic change because it’s a choreography for seven dancers in which we exchange experiences via a game of movement of our bodies.  I don’t know if it’s going to be any good, but for me it’s turning out to be wonderful because it’s the first time I’m sharing my dancing in a group format.

 “I can’t stand it when people say “break a leg!”

And lastly, do you have any quirky habit before going on stage?

I used to have many, but in fact, now I don’t any more.  I’m very obsessive in my daily life, but not on stage.  Well, yes, just one thing: I can’t stand it when people say “break a leg!”

 

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