Did you understand? is a piece that tries to dismantle the stereotypical idea of art fruition, involving the public as an object and as a subject of the performance. We go together through mimesis of the body, dance and spoken words, to suggest an auto analysis of the public of its  own role in this exchange that we call fruition, leading to a freeing, collective party. 

Performance is an outcome of a week-long artistic residency of the choreographer Tommaso Cavalcanti and the dramaturgist Giulia Cermelli in the frame of the international project Be International with AST / Nu Dance Fest as the co-production partner. Be International is designed to support cooperation of young Italian choreographers and dancers with international artists. 

TOMMASO CAVALCANTI is an Italian dancer, performer and choreographer with a strong passion for creativity and expression in several artistic fields. He has studied extensively, earning a high school diploma in filmmaking and acting from Mohole in 2015, and a Master's degree in Teatrodanza from Civica Scuola di Teatro Paolo Grassi in Milan in 2020. 

He performed in video dance projects for Rome Art Week in 2020 and Vouge Talents in 2021, He won StillDigital from MosaicoDanza in 2021 as choreographer and performer with his piece After. 

He has collaborated with several fashion brands as Marco Rambaldi and Etro during MFW22 and magazines as Nereidi Studios as a choreographer to create performances during shows and producing fashion videos.

In 2022, he created AM I LATE?, a site-specific piece for KoresponDance festival in Žďár nad Sázavou (CZ) and is working on a new project in Milan called The Sofa.

GIULIA CERMELLI (*1996) graduated in Intercultural Communication in Turin, where she published her first collection of poems Once we were poets. In 2017, she moved to Avignon for a year. There, she learned French and, working as an interpreter, began to approach translation. She graduated in 2021 as a playwright at the Civica Scuola di Teatro Paolo Grassi (Milan), where she wrote several texts and approached dance dramaturgy and video. In this field, she collaborated with Vogue Talents, Rome Art Week 2020 and in 2021, she won StillDigital from MosaicoDanza. 

After the academy, she moved to Brussels where she continued to train and work as a performer and dramaturg in Belgium and the Netherlands (Tic Tac Art Center, Koninklijk Conservatorium Antwerpen, Dans Brabant), and participated several times in the European BeInternational programme, through which she travelled around Europe participating in various festivals (KoresponDance (CZ), Nu Dance Fest (SK)). Her most recent project, The Sofa, with the company CCC, is expected to be in residence in Milan in March 2023.

As a playwright, she continues to train by taking part in the Theatre Biennale (Venice) 2022 with Deflorian/Tagliarini, and keeps on staging her show Cinque modi illegali di salvare il mondo around which she forms a company, Fitzcarraldo. Her most recent project Nessuno has just passed the second selection for the Biennale College di Regia 2023 in Venice.

Concept: Giulia Cermelli, Tommaso Cavalcanti 
Choreography: Tommaso Cavalcanti
Dramaturgy: Giulia Cermelli
Coaching: Petra Fornayová 
Dance: Marta Blašková, Miriam Budzáková, Eva Urbanová, Jozef Vaľo
The project is part of the year-round activities of Asociácia súčasného tanca. The project is co-organized by BeInternational, Civica Scuola di Teatro Paolo Grassi and Direzione Generale Spettacolo.