Sovaco de Cobra

Choreography: Lander Patrick
Dramaturgy: Jonas Lopes
Costume design: Lander Patrick
Lighting design: Rui Daniel
Musical direction: Lander Patrick
Composition and sound design: Mestre André
Created in 2022
Duration: 60 min
For 9 dancers

In Sovaco de Cobra (in English: snake’s armpit), Lander Patrick invites us into a world where the social rules are underpinned by an unfair game which gives arbitrary and brutal results. The performance invokes a chess board, a two-sided game where the winning advantage always belongs to one side of the table. With this strategic and warlike game as a visual and thematic backdrop, Lander Patrick creates an energetic performance that challenges the game’s rules, and the pieces in the game explore old and new dynamics.

Inspired in particular by the book Eduardo Galeano’s Las venas abiertas de América Latina (Open Veins of Latin America), which describes how colonialism created losers and persistent misfortune for large populations from some of the most resource-rich areas on earth, Sovaco de Cobra features nine of Carte Blanche’s dancers who throw themselves into the game with warmth and vitality. The performance is full of virtuosity and sharp and precise movements. In a collage of images and thoughts, the dancers orient themselves in a whirlwind of rhythms, tempo, seriousness, and playfulness.