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Sara Calero
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Text: Manuel Moraga Director, dance and choreography: Sara Calero; Cante: Gema Caballero; Flute: Bruno Duque; Cello: Sergio Menem; Guitar: Amir Haddad BEYOND THE METAPHOR Zero zone. A metaphor for “the changing stages life subjects us to, forcing us to begin at the beginning”. This is the concept Sara Calero works up in this show that debuted at the Pradillo theater within the series La Otra Mirada del Flamenco. And so it is, the idea is not only applied to the work, but to the artist’s own growth. A good beginning and a good ending. In between, a wide range of possibilities. Sara Calero is an experienced dancer, trained in the discipline of classical dance, and now concerned with acting and making her own mark. This second step is probably the most complicated for any artist. The dancer’s body is sculpted by and for dancing, and is technically flawless. Now she needs only to put these qualities at the service of creativity.
We mentioned a wide range of possibilities, and that’s exactly what it is. Sara Calero displayed her knowledge and command of various kinds of dance. She began in a folkloric vein and ended with her personal interpretation of serranas. Along the way there were subtle incursions into flamenco (abandolaos, guajira, etc.), and reflections of the bolero school as well as Spanish classical dance. The staging is very simple, with few resources. This is not a theatrically pretentious work, but rather given to straightforward music and dance, so we can speak of correctness, in other words, coherence between the form and the execution. The music is certainly noteworthy, with the wonderfully rich voice of Gema Caballero. The register we most enjoy in this singer is her velvet delivery, although on this occasion we were unable to appreciate such subtlety, perhaps because the show required a different sort of singing. Also important is the musical composition of guitarist Fernando de la Rúa, although he was not physically present on stage. By the way, this excellent musician, Fernando de la Rúa, is about to release his first solo recording. The music of Zona Zero is also the work of Bruno Duque, Sergio Menem and Pedro Esparza. And on stage Bruno Duque handles with wind instruments, while Sergio Menem is on cello and Amir Haddad on guitar.
Getting back to the dance, we wish to underline the idea of versatility as shown by Sara Calero, but we also understand that the most important thing in a performing artist is personality. Sara Calero is very resourceful, and has great knowledge of the material she handles. We urge her to continue working to find her personality, to discover her own mark, a signature that is recognizable and differentiating. As we said, her resources are many, and now the challenge is to find out how to release all that capital with personality. In actual fact, that’s the most difficult thing in any walk of life, and especially in art-forms. In our opinion, these markers of identity were easier to spot in the serranas, the abandolao and the panadero rhythms. Sara Calero is, without a doubt, in a new “zero zone” of her artistic career, and she will certainly surprise us more than once in the future. |
