In D̶A̶R̶K̶MATTER, Cherish Menzo (JEZEBEL, 2019) and Camilo Mejía Cortés pull seemingly recognisable images apart and knead these into a language of dance and movement entirely their own. Travel to the jet-black, punky, alienating D̶A̶R̶K̶MATTER universe where the possibilities of the body are stretched to the max. Against an apocalyptic jungle backdrop with a cinematic soundtrack, dark but stunningly beautiful play unfolds with a hypothetical body.

For DARKMATTER, Menzo draws on hip hop and rap culture, post-humanism and Afrofuturism; a movement oriented towards a future where Black people live in a hyper-technologized, decolonised world. Or one where colonisation never occurred.
  
To create her universe, Menzo took inspiration from space. From dark matter, where stars and black holes meet and collide. It is from these collisions that a new, mysterious, (Afro)futurist body arises. This is where a new language of movement can be developed.

As in her previous project JEZEBEL, Menzo stretches her language of movement by applying the Chopped & Screwed method. Chopped & Screwed is a remix technique within hip hop music that involves radically slowing the tempo. In D̶A̶R̶K̶MATTER, Menzo adapts this method for movement and dance.    
 

concept and choreography Cherish Menzo creation and performance Cherish Menzo and Camilo Mejía Cortés lighting design Niels Runderkamp music Michael Nunes costume design JustTatty.com scenography Morgana Machado Marques dramaturgy Renée Copraij and Benjamin Kahn singing and text coach BOИSU and Shari Kok-Sey-Tjong artistic consultants Christian Yav and Nicole

Cherish Menzo is a performer and performance-maker based in Amsterdam. In her artistic work, she is interested in the transformation of the body on stage and in the "embodiment" of various physical images. At first sight these seem unrecognisable, but by stressing their complexity and contrariness, Menzo questions the seeming norm. In her work, she creates a universe centred around the black body. She meanders between the nostalgia of the 90s and 2000s (hip hop, rap texts, sci-fi, manga) and speculative futures.