{"id":96300,"date":"2026-01-06T10:54:30","date_gmt":"2026-01-06T10:54:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ccmagazine.es\/?p=96300"},"modified":"2026-01-06T10:54:30","modified_gmt":"2026-01-06T10:54:30","slug":"hu-huwa-dance-as-if-no-one-were-watching-you-oliver-laxe","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ccmagazine.es\/en\/hu-huwa-dance-as-if-no-one-were-watching-you-oliver-laxe\/","title":{"rendered":"“HU (Huwa). Dance as if no one were watching you”: Oliver Laxe and spirituality"},"content":{"rendered":"

This immersive, multisensory proposal has been curated by Julia Morandeira Arrizabalaga<\/em> and Chema Gonz\u00e1lez<\/em>, and is conceived as a conceptual and formal extension of “Sirat”<\/em><\/a>, Laxe<\/em>\u2019s Cannes-awarded film and Spain\u2019s official submission for the Oscars.<\/p>\n

Body, sound, landscape: the matter of the soul<\/h6>\n

The installation begins with a gesture as simple as it is radical: the dancing body. Yet this dance is neither performative nor superficial \u2014 it is a form of prayer, trance, and channelling. As in the Sufism of Persian poet Rumi<\/em> \u2014 whom Laxe<\/em> evokes in the subtitle \u201cHU (Huwa). Dance as if no one were watching you\u201d<\/em> \u2014 bodily movement becomes a vehicle for ego dissolution and divine connection.<\/p>\n

The installation occupies two rooms in the Sabatini Building<\/em>. In the first, a pyramid of speakers stands like a three-metre-high totem. Inspired by rave culture, this object emits a constant vibration that is not intended to please, but to prepare the body for an experience of awe and openness \u2014 a sensory antechamber reminiscent of ancient temple atriums.<\/p>\n

In the second room, three looping projections depict desert landscapes filmed in Iran, where human figures dance, temples emerge like spectres, and speakers appear as technological ruins. Shot over a decade ago, these images evoke a sacred geometry in which architecture, nature, and spirituality converge.<\/p>\n

Vibration as narrative<\/h6>\n

Unlike narrative cinema, this installation offers no linear storyline. Laxe<\/em> embraces an abstract, atmospheric, and sensory language. The images \u2014 with soft fades and grainy textures \u2014 were transferred from 16mm film to digital, accompanied by a soundscape created by sound artist Kangding Ray (David Letellier)<\/em>, who explores the materiality of sound as a tool for spiritual construction.<\/p>\n

The installation proposes an immersive experience in which time dissolves. The viewer is not invited to understand, but to feel. Like a ritual, the visitor passes through phases of preparation, trance, and contemplation. The immanent becomes transcendent.<\/p>\n

HU (Huwa) as curatorial gesture<\/h6>\n

The project also marks a renewal in the curatorial language of the Museo Reina Sof\u00eda<\/em>. Curator Julia Morandeira<\/em> describes it as a \u201cradical treatment of space\u201d<\/em>: a sober, dark, sensorially dense exhibition device that places the body at the centre of the experience. Chema Gonz\u00e1lez<\/em>, meanwhile, highlights how the installation and the film programme engage in dialogue through the moving image in its various forms \u2014 cinematic, plastic, ritual.<\/p>\n

A mystical and telluric filmography<\/h6>\n

The programme “Landscapes in Trance”<\/em> accompanies the installation with a complete retrospective of Laxe<\/em>\u2019s filmography: from “Todos v\u00f3s sodes capit\u00e1ns”<\/em> (2010) to “Sirat”<\/em> (2025), including “Mimosas”<\/em> (2016) and “Fire Will Come”<\/em> (O que arde<\/em>, 2019). All of these works share a deep spirituality, a contemplative gaze, and a hypnotic rhythm. In his films, the visible becomes a portal to the invisible.<\/p>\n

Alongside this retrospective, the filmmaker has curated a “carte blanche”<\/em> selection of four films that reflect his aesthetic and philosophical affiliations: “Highway”<\/em> by Dvortsevoy<\/em>, “The Naked Island”<\/em> by Kaneto Shind?<\/em>, “The Seasons”<\/em> by Peleshyan<\/em>, and “Tr\u00e1s-os-Montes”<\/em> by Reis and Cordeiro<\/em>. Each of these works explores the landscape as a spiritual matrix.<\/p>\n

An artist in search of transcendent communities<\/h6>\n

Oliver Laxe<\/em>, born in Paris and raised in Galicia, has become one of the most singular voices in European cinema. But he is also a cultural agent who transcends the screen. Through the Asociaci\u00f3n Ser<\/em>, he promotes rural, community-based and heritage projects in the Os Ancares region. For Laxe<\/em>, cinema, art and life are one and the same: a way of seeking the sacred in the everyday, of generating community through both wound and beauty.<\/p>\n

In this sense, “HU (Huwa)”<\/em> is not merely a projection of images \u2014 it is a summoning of presences. Each visitor comes into contact with something beyond themselves: a vibration, an emotion, a silence. The experience is always unique and personal, because it is inscribed in the body, not in the intellect.<\/p>\n

Dancing as a form of mystical resistance<\/h6>\n

As you will see, “HU (Huwa). Dance as if no one were watching you”<\/em> is far from a conventional exhibition. It is a sensorial manifesto on the power of art to re-enchant the world \u2014 to remind us that beyond hyperproductivity, informational noise, and empty aesthetics, there are still spaces for the sacred, the poetic and the invisible.<\/p>\n

Laxe<\/em>\u2019s work does not seek to explain, but to transform through experience. His installation is a call to reconnect with the body as a channel, with vibration as a universal language, and with silence as a form of wisdom. It is, ultimately, a celebration of the human from the perspective of the transcendent \u2014 an intimate and collective dance that turns the museum into a temple, art into ritual, and the viewer into an active participant in a spirituality free from dogma.<\/p>\n

(*)<\/strong> Image courtesy of Museo Reina Sof\u00eda.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This immersive, multisensory proposal has been curated by Julia Morandeira Arrizabalaga and Chema Gonz\u00e1lez, and is conceived as a conceptual and formal extension of “Sirat”, Laxe\u2019s Cannes-awarded film and Spain\u2019s official submission for the Oscars. Body, sound, landscape: the matter of the soul The installation begins with a gesture as simple as it is radical: […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":96179,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[5910,5908,5902,5901,5900],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-96300","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-madrid-en","category-cities","category-exhibitions","category-artists","category-art-en"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n"HU (Huwa). 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