Dancing with Our Past

Part of the series Changing the Picture, sponsored by Time Warner Inc.

Choreographer and filmmaker Gabri Christa’s short films connect the relationship of historic buildings and sites to their environment, and reflect upon the people and cultures that inhabit them. Each film—Quarantine (2007, 10 mins.), Savoneta (2008, 14 mins.), and Kasita (2014, 21 mins.)—sheds a different light on Dutch history through dance, text, music, and movement. Filmed on the Dutch Caribbean islands of Curaçao and Bonaire, they tell stories of the Dutch African diaspora, from a time when Peter Stuyvesant was governor of both New Amsterdam and the Dutch Caribbean.

Quarantine is set in a former quarantine building for enslaved Africans. Savoneta is set mostly around the oldest plantation house (1653) on Curaçao. A couple attempts to enter the building, but the man performer has flashbacks of his ancestors that were once enslaved at the plantation. The film combines documentary pictures of the actual enslaved, and dance. In Kasita, when a young girl can’t keep the dog she just found, she knows just where to house it, but things do not go as planned.

Choreographer and Filmmaker Gabri Christa was born and raised in Curaçao, Dutch Caribbean. She came to filmmaking after a successful career as a choreographer and dancer. She choreographed and danced with companies such as Danza Contemporanea de Cuba (Cuba) and the Bill T. Jones Dance Company (United States).

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