The progressive wave (GbR) is a collaborative multidisciplinary project founded in Berlin by performance artists and choreographers Gal Naor and Matan Zamir.
Their multidisciplinary approach is inclusive and interfaces dance and visual art with sociopolitical content and consciousness studies. They produce a variety of independent and commissioned works in dance and theater and offer artistic and dramaturgical accompaniment and inclusive workshops. They interact with the visual art world using the performance medium, creating live installations and multichannel audiovisual works.
The progressive wave’s first creation, bodieSLANGuage, created in 2014 in collaboration with the Berlin-based duo-choreographers matanicola, consists of eight international Deaf and hearing performers, founded by the Capital Culture Fund of Berlin (Hauptstadtkulturfonds) and co-produced-by-Theater Freiburg and Ballhaus Ost, Berlin. In 2016, with the support of ID Festival Berlin, they embarked on their innovative performance trilogy Science of Signs – a theatric triptych exploring the relations between science, performance, and spirituality. Their dance lecture performance, Science of Signs I: Lights & Vessels, created in 2016, was presented in Radialsystem V (2016, 2017) and Trauma Bar und Kino (2018) in Berlin and Tanz Faktur, Cologne (2019) in the frame of Sommerblut Festival. Science of Signs II: Oráculo (supported by ID Festival, Berlin) is a collaboration with Theater Thikwa, staged in 2018 at Ballhaus Ost, Berlin, and was shown in Schwankhalle Bremen, in the frame of the eigenARTig festival. Oráculo Installation was presented in Berlin at Circle1 Gallery (2017) and at Trauma Bar und Kino, Berlin (2018).
The progressive wave’s recent artistic collaborations: In 2018, they collaborated with theater director Michaela Casper and Possible World Deaf Ensemble to choreograph the queer Sign Language adaptation of A Midsummer Night’s Dream by William Shakespeare, presented at Ballhaus Ost Theater in Berlin and Grillo-Theater in Essen, Germany. In 2019, with fashion label UY Studio, sound composer and DJ Dasha Rush, and Butoh artist Valentin Tzin, they created the contemporary site-specific dance ritual, Zone, which consisted of twenty performers, presented at Halle am Berghain in Berlin. In January 2020, they were invited by the Dagada dance company in Freiburg to choreograph LoveArchive, a performative installation presented at the Contemporary Art Gallery in E-Werk, Freiburg. In 2021, emerging Italian Deaf choreographer Rita Mazza invited Naor and Zamir to accompany her new creation, SPACE 1880, coproduced by Sophiensaele, Berlin, as artistic mentors. In 2022, they were invited by Greek theater director Zoe Xanthopoulou to choreograph her creation Bacchae Underworld with Deaf and hearing performers from Greece and Germany; the work premiered in May at Theatre aan Het Spui in Den Haag, Holland.