DIALOGUES
This is an open and free space initiated by Vertebra Dansa to reflect on and share perspectives on the major challenges of contemporary society. Through conversations with performing arts creators, the project addresses topics such as gender identities, accessibility, cultural diversity, and other social issues from a critical and inclusive perspective. This space serves as a meeting point for artists, social agents, and the public, where dialogue, listening, and debate help imagine new forms of coexistence and transformation through the performing arts.
Born in Barcelona, Daniel Mariblanca began his professional dance career shortly after graduating from the Institut del Teatre in 2005. In 2016, he moved to Norway to join Carte Blanche, the Norwegian National Company of Contemporary Dance. After seven years with the company and more than twenty years of professional experience, he took on the role of full-time Artistic Director of 71BODIES. He has created seven productions that have toured nationally and internationally. In 2026, the company is engaged in the creation of two new works.
71BODIES has received several awards, including Bergen Municipality’s Artist of the Year Award (2019) for 71BODIES 1DANCE, the Critics’ Award Pernilles Prisen (2022), and the top prize for Best Dance Performance at the Heddaprisen Awards for In First Person (2022). More recently, it received the Critics’ Awards (2025) for 71BODIES 1DANCE.
During the presentation of “When Is Now”, Daniel will share the work carried out by 71BODIES. He will explain the company’s methodology, integrity, and the origins of its artistic vision. Founded in Bergen in 2018, 71BODIES is an inclusive dance company of transgender people. Its primary focus is gender identity, particularly transgender experiences and issues. However, it is not limited to this focus and, without replacing one struggle with another, naturally evolves toward a colourful and multidimensional expansion of its vision through collaboration with other communities and partners.
“Jump with me into the Dark”
Born in Morocco, Saïd moved to Belgium with his family in the late 1960s. He became blind at the age of 14. As a young adult, he met Flemish choreographer Wim Vandekeybus / Ultima Vez in 1992, when the choreographer was looking for blind dancers for one of his productions. After numerous collaborations with Vandekeybus (1992–2001), Saïd founded his company Les BGM and created dance-theatre works together with Ana Stegnar.
For more than two decades, Saïd has worked as a dancer and actor in a variety of dance and theatre productions in Belgium and abroad. He also teaches Blindance at the Royal Conservatoire of Dance in Antwerp and leads awareness workshops for various organisations.
Together, we will explore the state of blindness, moving thought through space while adopting strategies that help us feel safe. We will move while observing what we feel and listening to the space around us. We will encounter other people, music, rhythm, and the vast sense of space and time that resides within the experience of blindness. Letting go in order to allow ourselves to be moved.
We will build trust to immerse ourselves in sensations, to trust, to become attentive, gentle, playful, and fearless. We will create and share with others while remaining open to the present moment.
