1. MEET THE COMPANY:
The Concept Project, an art dance company based in La Havana, Cuba. They started as an independent project and became one of the first official dance companies in La Habana to have a mix of movement languages in street styles, contemporary, and Cuban folklore. Led by Tulio and Miguel, The Concept Project strives to offer their community a space to keep growing with artistic synergies and experience an exchange of culture and knowledge with other artists around the world.
One of the big aim of The Concept, is to generate exchanges in the island of Cuba. Bring knowledge from other countries, outside their little island to help them grow. They believe in this project as a way to express to the world what is Cuba, leaving the stereotypes of their culture further than tobacco, rum and salsa. There is a big other interesting and artistic vision of the culture, the miscegenation and history.
THE CONCEPT is a space to feel safe, to express your feelings through movement and to support your people. They push each other creating a solid team who can help them expand their vision and use their creativity in every way. Exchanging and sharing is what moves them.
2. MEET THE LEADERS OF THE CONCEPT:
_Javier Pelaez Faure, everyone calls him Tulio. He is 28 years old. He started breaking at 14, two years later, started hip-hop and then he met other languages such as contemporary dance or theater. Nowadays he mixes different backgrounds, building with those styles new spaces and vocabulary where he feels safe. He is Co-director and choreographer at The Concept and co-creator of This Is My Concept, one of the biggest events in Cuba where through freestyle dancers find many possibilities with their movement and body.
_Miguel Álvarez Campos, from Havana, Cuba. He is 26 years old. His first steps in the dance scene were with the study of breaking, at the age of 14, which helped him to create a good foundation and base for his development as a dancer. He started learning other top styles such as hiphop or house dance. With all of these experiences and training he found the space of contemporary dance that made him achieve a new body language that identifies his style and his ideas. Co-director and choreographer at The Concept and co-creator of This Is My Concept.
3. SUPPORT THEM:
The Concept met Fidan (Haber Project) because of an exchange in Cuba. They were very interested in generating connections, in collaborate with that type of projects, creating spaces that haven't existed in Cuba before. They found working together is a win-win.
As a Non-Profit Organization, HaBer Project currently depends on sponsors or financial funding from the German government every year. This is a big challenge to keeping the sense of the project alive and growing in artistic and social perspectives. Project Home Art wants to support their projects and invites you to help us. They are working in collaboration this year to bring two dancers from Cuba’s The Concept Project to Berlin, Germany to participate in HaBer’s various projects that include dance events, camps and theatre productions. Their goal is to provide professional opportunities, knowledge, experience, and an international exchange to build resources and infrastructures to artists in other places. This year’s goal is to raise $1,200 USD. This amount will cover part of the expenses including flights, accommodations, food, and classes in Berlin for the 2 selected dancers. Let’s support our global art communities like the HaBer Project so that they can keep offering safe, diverse, creative, and belonging spaces for the artists and communities they are connected with.
DONATE TO THE CONCEPT HERE
Learn more about The Concept on:
- Instagram: @theconcept_cuba
- YouTube: The Concept Cuba
- Facebook: The Concept Cuba
To finish this stories, our question is: What does home means to you?
TULIO: "Home for us is a place where we feel good, the place where we feel free to be what we want to be, the place where we feel identified with the people who are part of it, the place where we can be comfortable to create, to do what we want on a higher scale. Home is that, it is not a physical place for me, home is a state of mind too, it is the people who are there with you pushing the “carro”, as we say here."
Miguel: "Home is where we could be ourselves, without any boundary, without any prejudice, that's it."