Night Walk

Night Walk is an invitation to a nocturnal, silent walk for a group of 25 people. After a collective warm-up for body and mind, we will set off after blue hour, encountering the darkness as it settles in and the spaces it creates.
In a world that is increasingly illuminated and monitored, we will walk through the Mendrisio, moving as a pack, alert and watchful, and experience the spaces and temporalities that night has to offer. We will allow ourselves to be guided by its smells, its shadows, and above all, its sounds. Night Walk is a journey through a fragment of night, into an environment that is first and foremost sonic. In a low-tech approach, this choreographic proposition reminds us that our bodies are powerful sensors of vibration: exceptional listening bodies, gigantic ears.
In the city, areas of darkness are gradually eroded by artificial light until they almost disappear. This is precisely what is at stake: it forces us to move along the margins, at the edges of paths, searching for the last pockets of darkness. Here, the artistic gesture consists in tracking down these dark spaces, slipping into them, merging with them for a moment, together and in silence, and allowing the places to reveal themselves differently.

Duration: 1h.

Eve Chariatte lives in Biel/Bienne and works in the field of dance and somatic practices as a dancer, choreographer, artist-researcher, and organizer of artistic residencies. At the heart of her practice lies the body and its fascia(inner connective tissus), serving as a starting point for practices, researches and creations in various environments, whether outdoors or in theatrical spaces. Currently she proposes NIGHT WALK in different contexts and festivals and Can you hold my hand for a while? is her current research project on dissection and the histories of bodily knowledges and perceptions.
Since 2022, Gregory Stauffer and Eve have been engaged in a shared artistic research project entitled MALVAUX – Center for movement research and explorations in the forest, located in Biel/Bienne (CH). They aim to contribute to the development of a field at the intersection of the arts, ecology, and society (malvaux.net).
She is also part of a new curatorial collective called Keine Krone and take care of a artistic place at the Alte Krone, Biel/Bienne til 2029.
She studied at SEAD in Salzburg and completed the EXERCE Master’s program in Montpellier (evechariatte.ch).

Cara amica di penna

Cara amica di penna is inspired by the practice of the pen friend/pen pal, which became widespread in the 1930s as a way to learn a new language through exchanging letters and encountering people from other cultures. The work explores intimacy, sensitivity, simplicity, and imagination.
The project began through an exchange of letters with inhabitants of the Ticino community, in the context of Ticino in Danza Festival 2023.
The performance takes the form of a letter—a choreography of language that activates the imagination to create micro-worlds and micro-choreographies. The audience enters a space arranged with chairs and cushions and encounters the performance/letter there. A score offers different ways of relating to and reading it, allowing the work to unfold without the continuous presence of a performer.
The audience can read silently or share the text with others. At different moments, they are invited to write, exchange pages, listen to music, or dance together.
In the final part, the “Letter to be Read Out Loud” is shared. Each reader encounters underlined or highlighted passages that become their lines. The letter is then read collectively from beginning to end, like a musical score, with different voices entering at different moments.

CREDITS
Research / Performance: Eleni Mylona
Dramaturgy: Rodia Vomvolou

Eleni Mylona is a dance artist, born in Athens and based in Zurich for the past fifteen years. Her work unfolds at the intersection of movement, language, and imagination, focusing on the relationships between body, language, and the imaginary. She creates collective forms in which reading, writing, dialogue, and dance come together to compose shared spaces of research, intimacy, and coexistence.
Her works often emerge through artistic research and have been presented in collaboration with organizations and festivals including Tanzhaus Zürich, Rote Fabrik Theater, Maxim Theater, MerumAtelier, Grube(n), Dance Days Chania, Eleusis – European Capital of Culture 2023, Ticino in Danza Festival, TanzPlan Ost’s ChoreoLab (2025), and Zürich Tanzt (2026).

Since 2023, she has founded and facilitated KATINES Zurich, a community for dance practice and research and a performative condition with a feminist ethos, which constitutes a central axis of her artistic work.
She has collaborated as a performer and participated in research projects with artists including Vera Mantero, Juan Domínguez, Danae Theodoridou, and Ana Sánchez. Her practice is also shaped by long-standing artistic relationships with Androniki Marathaki, Medie Mega, and Rodia Vomvolou.
She holds an MA in Performance Practices from ArtEZ University of the Arts and studied dance at the Leonidas De Pian School and the State School of Dance (K.S.O.T., Greece). She also holds a diploma in dance pedagogy from the Morianova-Trasta Higher Professional Dance School.

Between dance and words

This performance grows out of an open-ended process that has been unfolding for years in Casvegno, through encounters with people, their stories and their experiences. A journey that explores that mysterious, surprising and playful dimension in which the body becomes language.
Together with the audience, we would like to let words pass through the body, allowing them to transform and take on new meanings. And, in the silence that remains, make space for those dances that need no words.

© Irene Mastrobattisti

After her training in Northern Europe and the United States, Alessia Della Casa is now based in Italian-speaking Switzerland, where she works as a choreographer and coordinator of various cultural activities related to contemporary dance and a contemporary approach to the body. As a creator, in 2017 she was among the winners—together with Veicolo Danza—of the cantonal competition for dance mediation, launched by Reso – Swiss Dance Network and the Canton of Ticino's Department of Education, Culture and Sport, with the project Percorsodanza. In 2018, she was selected for the Young Audience Lab residency, promoted by Reso – Swiss Dance Network and directed by Erik Kaiel, with the project Becoming Little Red Riding Hood. In 2019, she was a semi-finalist of PREMIO SCHWEIZwith the project DANSONOGRAPHY. Since 2013, she has coordinated the Ticino in Danza festival, and since 2022, she has been developing a new Festival/Residency format, focusing the programming on new artistic practices of encounter and exchange among artists and with the audience.
veicolodanza.com

Simone Paris grows into a gymnast’s body at the Lugano Gymnastics Society before opening himself up to expressive movement and dance. He graduates from Giulia Staccioli’s Kataklò Academy of Physical and Athletic Theatre in Milan, where he subsequently collaborates with choreographers such as Erika Silgoner, Susanna Beltrami and Alberta Palmisano. After returning to Ticino, he periodically embarks on far-reaching forays into the vibrant hubs of the contemporary dance community across Europe. In Lugano, he works as a freelance teacher and dancer while exploring the variety of physical and expressive experiences, and the motivations that lead human beings to seek pleasure through them.

Mneme

Spazio Mneme is a project created within the Veicolo Danza association with the aim of sharing art, in all its forms and expressions, among young people in the Ticino region. A project managed by young people and designed for those aged 18 to 30, while remaining open to everyone, regardless of gender, political views, religion or nationality. A space where everyone is free to give shape to their ideas within a dynamic and creative environment.
Bridging ancient memory and contemporary expression, the name is inspired by Mnemosyne, the goddess of Memory and mother of the nine Muses, guardians of the Arts and protectors of their creators.

More information and registration: click here

Irene Mastrobattista is a young photographer and filmmaker born and raised in Ticino and trained at the Accademia Cinema Toscana in Lucca. She has worked as Director of Photography on several film and documentary projects. Passionate about fine art and documentary photography, she dreams of bringing her work to the Ticino region and collaborating with as many artists as possible.

Open Space

As part of the 2026 edition of Ticino in Danza, we are opening a space for encounters dedicated to those who live, move through, practise or simply take an interest in dance and the performing arts in Ticino.
An opportunity to meet, share experiences, questions and desires, and imagine new possibilities together, starting from one question: “How can we work together to build a performing arts scene that is more connected, collaborative and capable of generating new possibilities?”
We will work through Open Space Technology, a method that puts the people present in charge of shaping the agenda: there will be no topics or discussion tables set in advance. Everyone can propose an issue they feel is important, join the conversations that interest them and move freely between the different groups.
There is no need to arrive with a proposal or a fully formed idea. You can bring a question, an experience, a desire, something that is missing, something that already exists and could grow. Or simply the desire to be there, listen and meet other people.
The invitation is open to artists, cultural practitioners, organisations, venues and institutions, as well as residents, audiences, curious people and anyone who feels they have something to contribute to this conversation.

Participation is free. If you are planning to join us, we ask you to fill out this short form: it will help us organise the day as effectively as possible. However, advance registration is not required: the doors will remain open to anyone who decides to join at the last minute.

Link per annunciare l’interesse a partecipare: clicca qui

Silvia Ferrari is a theatre facilitator and curator with a passion for participatory processes and cultural innovation. For over ten years, she has worked at the intersection of performing arts, community engagement and international cooperation. As a research fellow at Ca’ Foscari University of Venice, she explores the role of culture in promoting wellbeing and active citizenship. Her practice brings together artistic curation, facilitation and audience development, as part of an ongoing process of learning and engagement with collaborative methodologies at an international level.