The film Leviah is a memoir about vulnerability, power, conformity, and loss of agency. Composed of a collection of memories from service in the Israeli military, LEVIAH brings to light a phenomenon that is rarely spoken about: The emotional trauma and despair that female soldiers in junior positions endure. In the male-dominated, hierarchical structure of national military service, many women lose control and gain eating disorders. They are forced to adopt a tough exterior yet are subject to sexual harassment. Coping mechanisms are common; willful memory erasure, dark humor, drugs, apathy, intermittent eruptions of sexuality. The performers’ bodies expose extreme conditions of vulnerability and control, as well as the shift from human to mechanic‚ one experiences within a charged social and military environment. LEVIAH reenacts the gradual but consistent toll that political groupthink takes on the individual psyche.

Many of Reut Shemesh’s stage pieces have films to accompany them. The stage piece LEVIAH was awarded with the Dance Theatre Prize of the City of Cologne in 2016 and has been performed and exhibited in many venues including the Art Cologne fair.

Reut Shemesh, born and raised in Israel, works in the field of contemporary dance, poetry and experimental film. She received her BA from the ArtEZ Institute of the Arts in Arnhem (NL), and KHM in Cologne (DE). Her works were exhibited and performed at international venues such as tanzhaus nrw Düsseldorf, Kampnagel Hamburg, Tanzhaus Zürich, Suzanne Dellal Center Tel Aviv, the Jewish Museum in Berlin, Art Cologne and Theatre Lab NYC, her stage piece LEVIAH winning the Cologne Dance Theatre Award in 2016. She is a regular guest lecturer for several universities in NRW.

Highlighted by Germany’s largest magazine for dance, ‘tanz’, as the dance scene’s „One to Watch in 2019“, the choreographer is currently a Factory Artist (resident artist) at tanzhaus nrw Düsseldorf.

This year she premiered her piece ‘Bad Mothers’ commissioned by the Oberhausen City Theatre, which is her first choreography for a resident acting ensemble and deals with the subject of motherhood and guilt. Starting in summer 2022, she will begin a long-term collaboration with the Belgian production house fABULEUS in Leuven (BE). Her piece ATARA, as well as the commissioned piece GOLA 3RD MOVEMENT for the Maslool Dance School will be performed at the Suzanne Dellal Centre in Tel Aviv (IL) this August. // www.reutshemesh.com

Directors: Ronni Shendar, Reut Shemesh
Production: Kunsthochschule für Medien Köln / Reut Shemesh Choreography
Production year: 2017
Film length in minutes: 19’00’’
Leading actors: Hella Immler, Reut Shemesh
Screenplay: Reut Shemesh, Ronni Shendar / Text: Shemesh
Camera: Ronni Shendar
Music: Simon Bauer
Editing: Ronni Shendar
Made possible by The City of Cologne, NRW Art Foundation, Ministry of Family, Youth, Culture and Sport, Academy of Media Arts Cologne; Supported by iDAS NRW / TanzFaktur Cologne.