Thevid/Oneness
Bedirhan Dehmen & Sule Ates

Garaj Istanbul,
IstanbulTurkey 2010

I performed in Tevhid/Oneness a piece about the travel of Şule Ateş, an İstanbul born and raised artist who has Alawi roots, to Erzincan, to her mother’s village Surbahan. With this autobiographical piece she traces her family’s roots, with the attempt to understand the essence of Alawi belief, its cultural practices, music, ritual, dance, prayer to understand what this belief really is. Her journey is to analyze how an artist who is born and raised in a metropolis can relate to her ancestry.

Together with choreographer Bedirhan Dehmen, his company and the acclaimed musician Cem Yildiz, Thevid brings together a contemporary melange of traditional Alevi dance, music, songs, rhythms, texts with modern elements of music and dance. Comprised of life performance of music and dance, the piece shows interviews, old photographs as well as digital animation.

Watch here: Thevid/Oneness GarajIstanbul Kasim 2010