Convention Cement
The Castellar de n’Hug Cement Museum and Konvent propose the sixth edition of KonventCiment. The well-established meeting between territory, culture and contemporary creation. A crossover day within time, space and art, which brings circus, movement, performance and music to one of the country's most unique industrial complexes.
The project stems from the desire to activate heritage from the present. The factory ceases to be merely a witness to the past and becomes a stage, material and context for new forms of creation. Architecture, landscape and industrial memory enter into dialogue with artists who work from the body, the object, transformation and contemporary languages.
The 6th edition presents five proposals that share a physical and experimental perspective: Kashikura, by Pilar Soliveres; Bark, by Marc Bosch; Blue and Red, from the Cherry Matakila Company, the musician and in this case driver and showman Bru Ferri and a musical session of’Elsa Guerra.
KASHIKURA – Pilar Soliveres
Kashikura was born from an improvisation in front of the mirror. By folding her body and inverting its perception, Pilar Soliveres discovers Paws, a physical creature that appears on the back of the legs and buttocks: a kind of flesh puppet constructed from twists, micromovements and imagination.
The piece starts from this character to investigate how women inhabit, display and transform their bodies. Soliveres moves away from the usual codes of beauty and desire to reclaim other possibilities: being misshapen, grotesque, sensitive, funny or monstrous.
With a minimalist staging, consisting mainly of a mirror, Kashikura turns intimacy into a territory of play and freedom. The body ceases to be a stable image and transforms before the audience, opening up a contemporary reflection on strangeness, sensuality and the right to construct other forms of beauty.
Pilar Soliveres is an Argentinian circus artist, acrobat and dancer. Trained in Performing Arts and Circus Arts at the Universidad Nacional de San Martín, she has been working in Europe since 2023. Kashikura is her first self-produced creation and is currently in the process of development.
BARK – Marc Bosch
Escorça is a contemporary circus piece that explores identity and power relations through the bond between a puppet and its puppeteer.
The show builds an intimate, physical universe in which body, object and manipulation blur. Who controls whom? Where does free will begin and dependency end? The relationship between puppet and performer becomes an image of the forces that shape us, protect us and also limit us.
The proposal combines circus, physical theatre and object manipulation. Technique is placed at the service of the narrative to construct a poetic, accessible yet critical experience, capable of speaking about power without abandoning playfulness or fragility.
The company was born from the collaboration between Marc Bosch and Andreas Avgousti. Marc Bosch is a circus artist and trapeze artist, trained in contemporary creation and connected with various projects in Catalan circus. His practice lies between physical research, critical thinking and the construction of stage universes through objects.
BLUE AND RED – Cherry Matakila Company
Two women, one dressed in blue and the other in red, meet in front of a wall. The wall is a limit, support, resistance and a space for play. Their bodies lean against it, cross it, become entangled in it and invent new ways of being together.
Bleu et Rouge builds a visual and physical world made of everyday, absurd and unexpected moments: a hand holding another hand, an obsession that cannot be let go of, a body that gets trapped, two women desperate to go to the toilet or the joy of an acrobatic feat that opens up a new possibility.
The piece combines trapeze, Cyr wheel, acrobatics and dance. The performers transform the Cyr wheel into an almost static trapeze and use the walls as a new acrobatic surface. Under a single coat, their two bodies also merge to give life to Panduro, a brilliant, expressive and surreal character.
Trained at the ESACTO’Lido in Toulouse, the members of Cherry Matakila Company develop their own language based on improvisation, humour, poetry and physical research. At KonventCiment they are presenting a version linked to the show's creation process, designed to adapt to the architecture and particularities of each space.
BRU FERRI
Musician, composer and performance maker, Bru Ferri develops a practice situated between music, the spoken word and performance. At KonventCiment he will take on the hosting of the event, connecting the shows, the artists and the different spaces of the factory from an artistic, direct and approachable perspective.
DJ ELSA GUERRA
Musical sessions that draw on selection, editing and narrative construction criteria typical of their visual practice. By crossing genres, eras and rhythms, they organise a sound progression geared towards dancing and the pleasure of enjoyment.
At KonventCiment she will be responsible for closing the day with a set that sees the dance floor as a shared space for connection and celebration.
Museum of Cement
The Cement Museum occupies the former Asland factory in the Clot del Moro, in Castellar de n'Hug. Founded by Eusebi Güell and in operation between 1904 and 1975, the factory is one of the most prominent complexes of Catalan industrialisation.
Designed by Rafael Guastavino, its architecture adapts to the slope of the mountain and combines iron structures, Portland cement and Catalan vaulting. The complex is currently part of the territorial network of the National Museum of Science and Technology of Catalonia.
KonventCiment proposed looking at this heritage not as an immobile structure, but as a space still available for culture, thought and contemporary creation.
Convention
Konvent understands culture as a tool capable of activating buildings, transforming territories and generating new forms. Its activity connects art, architecture, memory, landscape and community. Konvent understands culture as a tool capable of activating buildings, transforming territories and generating new forms of gathering.
Cultural centre located in the former convent of nuns of the Cal Rosal textile colony, in Berguedà. For over thirty years it has operated as an independent space for creation, residency, and exhibition, with a particular focus on practices that often remain outside conventional cultural circuits.