Sonja Pregrad is a Croatian dancer, performer, organizer, and collaborator. She is currently living between Berlin and Zagreb, teaching at the Zagreb Academy of Fine Arts (Department for Animated Film and New Media) and ROAR program in Berlin. She has acquired an MA in Solo/Dance/Authorship at Universität der Künste Berlin as well as a BA at ArtEZ in Arnhem. Sonja has made work on her own and has developed long-term collaborations with Willy Prager, Ana Kreitmeyer, Silvia Marchig, Zrinka Simicic, performing internationally. She is a founder and producer of the festival Improspekcije, artistic organization Fourhanded, and collective platform Antisezona. As a performer she has been working with choreographers Meg Stuart, Boris Charmatz, Isabelle Schad, visual artist Sanja Iveković, and many others. She is a recipient of two Croatian Theatre Awards. 

Podcast with Sonja was recorded on 15 January 2020, via Skype. It was edited and produced on the Gadigal land of Eora nation, traditional custodians of the land on which we live, work, and dance. We pay our respect to their elders, past present and emerging.

Podcast image is by Lena Kramaric.
Music used is by Trevor Brown.

Artemis Projects production, commissioned by Delving into Dance and Critical Path for the Interchange Festival.

Podcast with Sonja Pregrad (full transcript)

Ira Ferris: What three words come to your mind when you think about dance?

Sonja Pregrad: Hm….  It's funny because my dog that is sitting on my lap is licking the computer as we speak. And why I find this funny is that for me, dance is not so much about words, and already dance as a word is... it's such a big word. So, the reaction of my dog licking the computer, touching something, would be the first thing that I feel when I feel dance. Touching things.

Ira Ferris: Do you mean touching space around you, or touching other bodies, or ... How does touch relate to dance in your view?

Sonja Pregrad: I guess that's a very idiosyncratic thing. For me, touch has always been one of the strongest sensations in dance, and I guess also in life. So, I think it comes very much from who I am. But my most formative dance classes at the dance academy where contact improvisation classes. Through contact improvisation, I would feel touching of the earth, I would feel my weight pouring, I would feel the borders of my body in contact with the ground, with other bodies, with objects, with the air. All these would inform my dancing much more than seeing the shape of another body and trying to reproduce it. So, I know for myself that I've always been much more tactile than a visual dancer. And there is this notion that we are constantly touching everything, so our body is a collection of touches. And then also I am interested in the mechanics or politics of touch, in the sense that we always touch and are being touched. So, there is always a mutuality. It's a gesture which is always active and passive, or receptive. It's a basic interaction which is there by the fact of the existence. And I think that is fundamental to how I experience life.

Ira Ferris: I'm wondering if this is something that you would be as conscious of if you hadn't had a training in dance?

Sonja Pregrad: It's a good question. So, I guess in some way, ... I don't know if this is too anecdotal, but when my father was very sick, shortly before he died, he told me: 'You know, I could still peel a potato perfectly, with my eyes closed.' My father has always been very sensitive to touch, and in a way I think that's something genetic that I have inherited. But I wouldn't have been so aware of it hadn't I done dancing and dance training since I was a child, and if it wasn't my daily practice and something I have been looking into both practically by doing it and also by thinking about it, understanding how it works and what it means politically or philosophically. For sure, that makes me more aware of it. And for me, that's one of the fundamental reasons why I dance, because dance is the space to become aware of that and to practice that and to practice the many aspects of what it brings, like the empathy, the connection, the unknown, the listening and receiving, the giving, the being confirmed by, and being able to be in the unknown. So, all these things that are on the one hand very self-confirming, and on the other they bring me in relation to others. I am aware of the privilege that this is my profession and of the fact that nowadays and also historically the bodies have been suppressed, and that there are strict oppressive rules of how much and in what way bodies can inhabit themselves, interact with the other bodies; of the ways the systems organised the sensitivity, the sensuality, the sexuality, the gender, the race, the productivity. And nowadays some of these things are supposedly liberated, but still body is being controlled by the power systems or by capitalism. So, many bodies do not move much, do not spend a lot of time in the nature or in the sensation of other bodies. There is this digitalised system of control that we participate in. So, I am often confronted with how these things that I find fundamental, might not be so fundamental or so accessible to other people around me. And yeah, it can feel very special or very strange for people who are not professional dancers.

Ira Ferris: A while ago, somebody told me that we live in a ‘touch starved’ society, and I'm just raising this as a comment, because you spoke about it just then. You also mentioned this idea of our bodies being suppressed by capitalism, not free to move. In writing this piece, I was reading a text by an anthropologist who was saying that dancing was something that we innately did, as a natural thing. We danced before we used language and we expressed ourselves through moving, through dancing. And then somewhere along the line in the history and not that long ago, dance became an art form, and by becoming this aesthetic thing, it excluded many bodies. It became something that some bodies do, for others to watch; while in the past, it was something that we did together. So, I'm wondering what becomes of us when we stop dancing, when we stop connecting to this thing that's innate and natural to us? And what is that thing that stops some people from dancing, in your view?

Sonja Pregrad: I think that the narrative, the history, herstory of dance, is multiple. It's not a singular narrative. We used to gather and dance and we still gather and dance; rave and techno are very popular. And I think this is what dance as a social practice is; the connection, the ritual, the synchronising, the harmonising of the bodies and the energies, the rising of the energy within the body. All of that happens in the rave parties all over the world. But I think what happened is that society got very specialized, and I think that's not only about dancing, it's about language, it's about the domination of the Western system of thought, it's about a very strong religion that has oppressed the body. And I also have this semi-professional theory inspired by a friend who has sheep. He used to have a lot of them and now he has only five and they are all female sheep and when he needs the male sheep or ox, he rents it. After he told me this, I started thinking: Ok, so if there is a lack in nature, female bodies are preserved because they're incubators for life, they preserve ongoingness of life, which got me thinking of the whole history of patriarchy and the oppression of the body. I started wondering could it be that the whole patriarchal system, white system, oppressive system that we have nowadays, is partly this neuroticism of male needing to control or needing to put themselves in some other way into a higher position so that they would not be scrapped off first, if the danger comes. And given where we are in the life of the world at the moment, it could very well be that the patriarchy, the male body is struggling to keep control of something that's obviously going to change. And I think it's some kind of struggle for survival because the destruction is underway. So, I guess we are struggling for survival already. So, coming back to your question: did we stop dancing? I don't know if we stopped dancing. For sure, the ways of entertainment and interaction and ritualising life have gotten complex and we moved away from the body and towards the mind and language and technology. But then on the other hand, everybody still lives in their body; we still don't live outside of our bodies. And that's maybe also a question, where it will go now with the digital and the virtual taking over our time and existance. But still, everybody has to negotiate living within their bodies; from eating to peeing, pain to pleasure, to dying. All of that is still inescapable.

Ira Ferris: But many, many people, … And I guess that's another thought I had while thinking about the importance of dance, which is basically, as you're saying, the importance of being consciously within your body. Because for me, one of the things, one of the major takes that I got from the good fortune that I had of being trained in dance, and experiencing my body moving in space, is that consciousness of being in and having the body and being capable of hearing my body, being able to consciously occupy the space. And I'm seeing that many, many people don't have that; it's not just something that's innate in that sense, you know, or it was but it's lost because as you're saying, we still have places where we get up and dance but not everyone feels like they can. There are so many people out there who think that they can't dance. And to me, this idea that somebody can't dance is so painful in a way, because I really, really believe that anyone can dance. And some people who say that they can't and then end up somehow braving and going onto the dance floor do amazing things that people who think that they can dance never discover. You know, my experience with some trained dancers is that they can be quite restricted on dance floors because they think too much. While somebody who never tried training in dance invents these amazing movements. I guess what I'm trying to say is that anyone can be part of this and that we need it in a way, as a way of being conscious of our bodies, as you were saying,

Sonja Pregrad: I mean, the truth is that the society has these thoroughly prescribe rules of the collective, and I think that dance in the earlier societies also had a function in the practice of the exercise of the collective. And I guess back then everybody learned the steps of the folk dances in the village, but with the society we have now, the prescription of the collective has gotten untangled. And I think in many ways moving away from this belonging to the collective or having to obey to the collective before an individual need has been emancipatory and it has allowed a lot of freedom or space for rights, especially for the minorities, for the different ones in the society. And at the same time, of course, the beneficial aspects of the choreography of the social have been lost. And I really think that a big part of this is language. We are so invested in language, you know, in terms of how people think of language and thought; it has such a higher status than feeling or sensation. I was in the studio with a colleague of mine this weekend and we do this exchange of practices around choreography of touch or touch as choreography, and he told me he wanted to practice speaking as touching and listening as being touched. Now I'm trying to feel if I can have this sensation with you, but you are far away and we only touch each other through hearing the sound of each other. But I also know that you are probably sitting somewhere in front of the computer. And I know that you have a head, and I know where your ears are and that you are listening. And probably there are square walls around you. And you're probably tuning in to my speaking. And I know that you are breathing and your weight is touching the chair or the couch you are sitting on, and the floor underneath. And in the timing of how I speak, I actually touch you in a way, I affect you. So that's connected to this practicing of speaking as touching, which relates to time, and timing, and space. And it also, I think, changes speaking and thinking.

Ira Ferris: It's related to rhythm in a way, isn't it? The way we talk, it's music. We create music through which, you know, you were mentioning breath and our breathing is pulsating with the beat of that music that we create through words.

Sonja Pregrad: Yes. And the speaking coming out on a breath is also connected directly to the timings of our bodies. I love this idea of practicing embodied thoughts and embodied language. It is, I guess, quite a subversive thought. It's not taken for granted in a supermarket, or in universities, or in political headquarters. And maybe, it will be because through rhythm, and timing, and synchronising, it works so fast. It works faster than cognition, I guess. So, at some points for sure, it will be of use to society. And then it's a question of who controls it? I mean, if you think of technology nowadays and the touch phones and the touch screens of the smartphones, they work through touch; and all these digital interfaces also work with rhythm of how images appear or how you scroll. So, I guess, it's partly there, but there's also, of course, the danger in it, because it has power in it. And then power is also controlled and misused.

Ira Ferris: Well, it's interesting because touching those sorts of surfaces, we also become very detached from our own bodies. And again, you know, it's you who have this awareness of touching another object. But many people, I think, don't have that awareness that they're actually affecting something by the way of touch. But talking about rhythm, language and music; have you experienced dancing in silence?

Sonja Pregrad: Actually, most of the dancing that I do .... [laughs] … I want to say is in silence, but then what is silence. But maybe, what I wanted to say is that most of the times I dance, I don't dance to music or inspired by music because there's already so much in the dancing; there's so much rhythm in shifting the weight; there's rhythm in how the parts of the body coordinate with each other; there's rhythm in the patterns of objects or landscape around me; there are other sounds because it's never silent; there are other sounds of the world or the sounds of the room that I'm dancing in. So, there's already so much information. So, my feeling is that dancing with music is very often deafening, like dancing in gloves, putting something on top and erasing so many other information which are subtle. Dancing to music, on the other hand... Music has an impetus and sometimes it can serve a purpose. If I think when do I dance to music, I dance to music when I go out and dance with people. And then I enjoy it because then it gives us a lead for a group of people to move together, or in a more complex social situations where we don't know each other and we don't share what dancing could be, then music gives a certain kind of impetus or code or impulse for all of us to synchronize with, and then it's an agent that leads us to dance together. For me personally, I also really love dancing to silence because it is open, and we can negotiate how we dance together in a dance studio or even while walking with my dog and approaching somebody and listening to the timing, or how close do we come and how they move and when do they turn and if they stop. And there is rhythm around us all the time.

Ira Ferris: So, would you say that you dance all the time?

Sonja Pregrad: It's a good, interesting question because I do feel that sometimes I don't dance enough. So, I guess the honest answer would be no. Although in some way, in some conceptual way, I would also say yes, because I think that bodies move and orchestrate or choreograph themselves all the time. And I guess I do very often use the tools, the sensitivities that I learned through dancing, not only in the dance studio or in a performance or at a dance party, but also in life. And then it's interesting when the dance as dance begins. There's something about dancing, and I've spent a lot of time in my master around it where basically, what I said was that dancing was when I moved with this sensitivity without other purpose. That was dancing. And I didn't have to do some special movements for it to be called dance. But dancing is not cooking [laughs], even though sometimes I do feel that cooking can be dancing or that there could be a swing to it. But there is something about dancing that it's about the joy of dancing. It's about the joy of moving or feeling the rhythm or feeling the sensations of my body and the things around. And I go into that space and I loop attention around that, and then that's the trip. And this can happen to me in a dance class, it can happen sometimes at home when I really focus on it. It can happen to me in nature. It can happen to me in a performance. And it can happen to me in the club as well.

Ira Ferris: So dance is always associated with joy?

Sonja Pregrad: It's associated with joy of feeling alive, and also the joy of sensing. I mean, it's also ... It's not... And now, I have to laugh because I wanted to say it's not a duty and it's not a labor, but at the same time for me it is the labor because I'm a professional dancer so very often when I dance, it's my job and I have to do it in the time that I'm asked to, and I have to do it good enough so that it's assessed as good and there's somebody willing to pay for it. I have to deliver things, I have to dance for 45 minutes to find the phrase that will be in the piece at the end. So, there are laborious aspects of dancing for me, but I guess in its nature, there's something in dance which is the suspension from the efficiency or getting a goal out of it. It's a celebration of feeling and I think in that there is joy. So, in that way, it's always joyful.

Ira Ferris: Although you are a professional dancer, you said that you also sometimes feel that you are not dancing enough. What are those moments when you feel like you're not dancing enough? How do you recognize them? What happens that this thought: 'I haven't been dancing enough,' comes to you?

Sonja Pregrad: For example, I have now been sitting on my chair for 47 minutes, 45 seconds speaking to you, which is partly a tangent of my work. And before that, I was sitting for an hour writing an application. So, in my work as a dancer, there's still a lot of work which is not dancing, and I think this gives me a feeling that sometimes there's an urgency about that and there is not enough of that loose space for dancing, for having time and space to give into that sensation of my body and rhythms and touches and dance. Yeah, I guess mostly that. And then, sometimes it is also about being rigid and not being able to relax and let go, because I think I need to get the work done first, so I will spend hours in front of the computer and sometimes I will miss going to the studio. And I see this also in life in general. How often do I find moments to surrender and to enjoy? And I think that's common to how people live. When do we allow ourselves to dance?

Ira Ferris: That's really beautiful and makes me think of another question... Whether there are moments when you are dancing, let's say you're performing, and you're just not getting to that point where you are able to surrender and there is still a bit of rigidity, there is still a bit of thinking. Because one of the things you said at the very beginning is that you feel dance, you are not thinking dance and you struggled to put it into words. So, let's say there is this moment on the dance floor in front of the audience, and you are just not getting there, you are not sinking in, you are not letting go completely. And I'm sure it happens at times where you're just outside of your body, in some way. Would you then say that you are not dancing, if dancing for you is about surrendering?

Sonja Pregrad: One of the things that I have learned through learning dancing was about flow and about change and about instability. It's of course something we know, but maybe I became aware of this process through dancing because dancing is movement, it's never still, it's always in the state of oscillation. But I remember learning this and I remember also struggling with these. Like, when am I in, and then why am I not in, or does this work or does this not work? And something that I've been practicing for this 30, or 35 years that I've been dancing and especially through my adult dancing is flowing with the state of change. So, the simple answer is yes. Because flowing is allowing myself to be on these waves and changing and learning how to let go; how to roll down when it goes down and how to come up when it comes up. So, I surrender when I get tensed and rigid. I find ways to acknowledge that and stay with it. And I wait for another breath to come in and to take me further. I look at how to process and work with the sensations, and how not to grasp but to move, to dance. So, yes, most of the time when I'm on stage I think of what people think and if it's good enough and part of me is rigid, like it is most of the times in my life, but I ... I actually think this is the practice and this is the dance. And then sometimes there are moments of bliss, of ascension, a transcendental experience. But my practice of dancing is this moving. It has been one of the most important teachings that I have received through dancing and one of the most important tools that I have to deal with life, and one of the most important things to pass in teaching because I think that this is politically one of the most important things to pass on.

Ira Ferris: How does it translate in life?

Sonja Pregrad: To exactly that thing. Because it is of life. This constant becoming and dying is of life, and constant change, and us not being in control, and us moving in time and space with our legs and on the Earth.

Ira Ferris: What is your relationship to the Earth as a dancer, to the environment, to nature, to Mother Nature? Or as a human being who happens to be a dancer.

Sonja Pregrad: Well, I am a part of it and I'm touching it and I'm influenced by it all the time and I'm influencing it. And I have my agency, because I walk, I press things, I eat, I breathe, I drive, I speak. So, I try to work with that. But it's also not a simple question because on one level there's this sensation of wholeness and harmony that is also experienced through dancing, through harmonizing, through being sensitive. And at the same time, I am part of a society which is polluting, killing different species, different forms of life. And I do that. I drive in cars and buses and I have my computer. So, I'm trying to feel this and understand it, and account for it, being sensitive to consequences of my interaction with nature and then acting upon this feeling.

Ira Ferris: When I approached you to do this interview and I mentioned that a question I'm looking at is Why Dance Matters Now?, you've said that it seems to you there is this new urgency for it in the context of the fires in Australia. What did you have in mind when you said that?

Sonja Pregrad: Yes, I was also thinking about this today, how I am not exactly in Australia, and I was wondering how my experience, my embodied experience of it is different than yours who are there. And I guess that embodied experience helps process how the things are and how to deal with them. And for me, it's all just an image on screen. But there's a sensation of horror and terror to it, and urgency. And in some way, I think it's important to feel it.

Ira Ferris: And why does dance matter in the context of that?

Sonja Pregrad: Because in some way, I think that dance as a tool of embodiments and of being together and harmonising, and of being sensitive is an important tool for life and future of life and collectivity and humankind. And then there's something on top of that, like seeing the images of these fires and understanding that you walk around with masks and I don't know how many millions of animals are extinct; there's a huge sense of terror, and also sadness and guilt. And maybe that's not a place to dance. But in some way, I guess what dance can offer is a space for feeling; of feeling sadness, loss and empathy. And in some way, maybe also a space of comfort to regain the joy of life so you can go on and try to affirm something in the face of this. I think that's something really important because, for me personally, and I think this is some general generational thing, there is a sense of being responsible for things falling apart, worry about the condition of the world. And amongst that, for me the practice of coming to the body often helps to regain the sensation of well-being so that I can go out and act again. And of course, sometimes it's urgency, sometimes you have to act very fast to stop the fire and very fast to run and hide. But at the same time, we are still in the process of restoring life. We are still trying to evolve, to deal with this, to set the future forward. And I think it's important to have a refuge or to have a contingent of well-being or a space where well-being can be resourced, so we can invest into building a future.

Ira Ferris: Yes, I agree. Yes. Because there is lots of guilt at the moment associated with having fun. You know, when people are suffering, animals are dying, trees are burning, the sky is grey. I mean, why would you go and dance? But I also see that people are just spiralling down this depressive state and news and images of horror. And yeah, I feel that we need to step out of it every so often. We need to recharge in order to keep going because you can't keep going if you are completely emptied.

Sonja Pregrad: Yes, and we should also remember that at times dances were used to mourn, to provide space for collective mourning, for collective emotion processing, for collective hope nurturing. That's also a really important function of dance at the moment.

Follow Sonja’s practice:

Website: sonjapregrad.dance

Photographers:

Image #1 on this page: Jasenko Rasol
Image #2 on this page: Marko Gutić MIžimakov
Image on the home page: Leni von Geleva