Return To A Strange Land

Photo: Hans Gerritsen

Choreographer: Jiří Kylián

If you start searching for the unknown, you will find an unknown land. The title 'Return to a Strange Land' refers to the threshold between one state of consciousness to another.

The substance of the body has always been present on the other side:
the subconscious. Living means becoming conscious, dying is returning to the other land; the strange land of the origin.

The work was conceived under the impact of John Cranko's sudden death – passing/re-appearance, death and rebirth becoming its main inspiration.
The Stuttgart Ballett, of which he was the artistic director, was suddenly facing complex questions and problems. The door between the two worlds appeared to be wide open.
Each of the four parts of this ballet relates to this subject – each in its own way.

– Program 1984