Josep Maria Esquirol says that the greatest mystery is not death, but birth. Manuel Rodríguez created this solo following the death of his mother, and for him zero is the figure that envelops the mystery of the void that connects beginning and end. The body Manuel presents on stage exists in a kind of transitional state between one void and the next, a fragile, provisional human landscape sustained by memory and desire, yet constantly on the verge of dissolution.

ZERO is an introspective, intense piece, performed with remarkable physical precision, in which the body becomes a surface in contact with other surfaces: a membrane that gets soiled, creased and even torn. Because wounds are etched into the skin just as words are on paper, and living means slowly getting covered in scars. Sometimes the marks are sharp and clearly defined; at others, they are scattered blots of ink. But whatever form they take, they gradually turn us into an archive of confused handwriting. Between zero and zero lie all the traces.

Another of Manuel’s aspirations is to investigate how an ineffable language is articulated, and where it settles. When words are not enough and meaning cannot contain what evades it, the voice practically becomes an invocation, a channel that doesn’t convey ideas but instead strives to contain and inhabit the folds of time. Prepare to experience time flowing backwards.

Body, voice and space form the triad of elements that Manuel pushes to their limits. His vocal research, which seeks the sound of a visceral, deeply personal language, links this piece to El discurso by Rosa Romero, while breathing, which here becomes an almost shamanic pillar of existence, is also the cornerstone of KMs of Resistance by Mehdi Dhakan.