conversations in ten questions 90: Fernando Melo

Waiting for Leaning Tree (Studio Stage - The Royal Danish Opera, 2025, March 8th) © Mehmet Kerem Özel

Leaning Tree is a dance piece produced by the Dansk Danseteater (Danish Dance Theatre) and the Copenhagen Philharmonic Orchestra. It was choreographed by Fernando Melo and its music composed by Signe Lykke. The first performances of Leaning Tree, which took place at the start of the 2023-2024 season in the main hall of the Royal Danish Theatre, were presented to the audience with live music performed by eight groups of musicians placed in different areas of the auditorium as well as in the orchestra pit, creating a feeling of immersiveness. In the 2024-2025 season, Leaning Tree was once again included in the programme of  Dansk Danseteater, this time performed with recorded music at the Danish Royal Opera's small hall, Studio Stage, as well as in various cities across Denmark, and at the Kuopio Dance Festival in Finland.

Comprising 13 dancers from around the world and led by Spanish choreographer Marina Mascarell as artistic director since 2023, Dansk Danseteater enriches its repertoire each season with Mascarell's works as well as pieces commissioned from choreographers she selects.

Fernando Melo's Leaning Tree is inspired by the art of the famous Danish painter Wilhem Hammershoi. In Hammershoi's paintings, the rooms are mostly empty. There is one table, one chair or a wall piano in each room. There are also one or two small paintings hanging on the walls. The doors are usually open, showing the depth of the house. If there are people in the pictures, they are usually female, alone, and not looking at the viewer, or they are deep within the house, seeming to be trapped between layers of walls, wandering around; they appear to be lost in thought or daydreaming; they are full of mystery. Light enters the rooms through the windows or through the open doors, but we don't know where the light is coming from.

In Leaning Tree Melo does not choose to make direct figurative references to Hammershoi's monochromatic paintings, which depict simple, minimally decorated and often uninhabited interior spaces, or to directly re-enact them on stage; instead, he establishes a deeper relationship with them. Melo's Leaning Tree is dominated by the spirit, emotion and atmosphere of Hammershoi's melancholic world; that is filled with loneliness, simplicity, silence, emptiness and the storms that rage within a person's inner world, unnoticed from the outside.

in Leaning Tree the first image Melo presents to the audience is a L-shaped wall with a door on its short side in the twilight, a table in front of the wall, and a young man sitting with his head facing us and his arms resting on the table. This part of the space, described only by a wall, occupies three-fifths of the stage area. In the remaining its two-fifths bodies lying on the ground, one on top of the other, side by side, are faintly discernible in the darkness beyond the twilight. As the piece begins, the bodies lying on the floor slowly move, stand up, and squeeze themselves against the outside of the door (facing them), as if they were being pulled by a device used to let air into a package. Then, the young man at the table gets up, notices the letter on the table, picks it up, and puts it in his pocket. As he goes to the door and opens it, the others on the other side fill into the room through the door. As he walks back towards the table, the others circle around his body, rubbing against him. When he turns back to the table and assumes the position we saw at the beginning, the others have already spread out across the room, but all of their faces are turned towards him. Shortly after, we notice that he is slowly disappearing into his clothing. The clothing he is wearing, like in science fiction films where the character's death leaves the clothing lifeless and piled up where it is, is now piled up on the table.

For the next 45 minutes or so, we watch what the young man might have written in the letter, hinted at in this opening scene, which suggests his departure from a place, a love affair, his family, a community, or —most likely— his life. Those who are pressing against the door from the outside —may be his family, his friends, or his loved ones, mentioned in the suicide note the young man left on the table— are swirling around him, rubbing against him as they enter the room when he opens the door at the very beginning of the piece. They become a whirlpool, a tornado.

At this point, I would like to give an example of Melo's breathtaking creativity in constructing the narrative: A woman stands in front of a wall, making gestures with a letter in her hand. In the mirror on the wall, which reflects this side and shows the other side (the back side of the stage) when lit from behind, we first see another woman mirroring the first woman, and shortly after, we see four or five other figures, both male and female, alongside her. It is clear that the silhouettes of the people mentioned in the letter the woman is holding are the ghosts of those other figures. The idea of transforming the story contained in a letter into a scene like this is, in my opinion, a breathtakingly beautiful act of creativity. However, the narrative in this sequence does not end here. In the scene that immediately follows, Melo has the dancers turn the wall around, and this time we see the inside of the mirror. Now the woman who was on the front side of the wall moves to the back side (i.e., the side shown to the audience), and the previous movements/choreography are repeated, but this time with the woman among the others. In other words, the choreography that was previously presented in fragments and ‘framed’ (i.e., as seen through the mirror) is now shown to the audience in its entirety.

In Melo's stage design, created in collaboration with Raphael Frisenvænge Solholm, the wall, which is the most important element of Leaning Tree, is also like one of the dancing bodies; it bends, breaks, closes in on itself, shows its back, a window opens on it, the other side is visible through the window, and a transparent mirror is placed on it, reflecting one side and showing the other. All of this is done by the dancers themselves, without hiding the wall from the audience. When the wall is turned around, the technical details that hold it up are fully visible; in other words, there is no intention to create a realistic illusion or imitation of a space on stage. However, Melo has established the atmosphere of the performance, and especially its pace, with such a smooth fluidity that, as a viewer, you overlook the physical and technical characteristics of the wall and accept it as one of the protagonists of the piece.

Melo adds time, memory, and social relationships to the physical three dimensions of the space he defines around the wall, adding a fourth dimension, transforming the space around the wall into a meaningful ‘place’.

In addition to the wall, the other stage elements of the performance include a table, two chairs, a two-legged lamp, and a rug. However, none of these are used as mere ‘props’; they are elements that construct the world and meaning of the piece, and thus none of them remain mere ‘decoration.’

The composer of the piece, Signe Lykke, describes Leaning Tree as ‘an attempt to build a bridge between the disciplines of music and dance,’ and defines it as follows: ‘Leaning Tree is a play on perspective; a constant transition between what is visually tangible and what lies beyond; a world of inner feelings and images triggered by physical movements and sound.’

Melo uses illusion to create the world Lykke describes, thereby playing with the audience's perception. One of the most important elements serving Melo in creating illusion is Raphael Frisenvænge Solholm’s atmospheric yet expressionistic lighting design.

And of course, the most impressive element in the piece's affectiveness is the cast of dancers, who compete with each other in masterfully executing the choreography, which combines physicality, flexibility, energy, and rigorous mathematics. This article will be incomplete if I don't mention their names: Nicky Daniels, Wolf Govaerts, Lucas Hartvig-Møller, Jessica Lyall, Lola Potiron, Yi Shao Li, Leticia Silva, Carlos Luis Blanco Ramos, Finn Armstrong, and Grace O’Brien. 

Applause for Leaning Tree (Studio Stage - The Royal Danish Opera, 2025, March 8th & 9th) © Mehmet Kerem Özel

the board in the foyer where the audience can share their ideas by writing on it (Studio Stage - The Royal Danish Opera, 2025, March 9th) © Mehmet Kerem Özel)

Following my impressions of Leaning Tree, I now turn the floor over to Fernando Melo to answer my questions.

What is the essence of performance in your opinion?

For me, the essence of performance is closely connected to why I create works for theaters and dance companies in the first place. It’s also why I believe art plays such an essential role in society. 

After many years of performing and choreographing contemporary dance (I began my dance education at the age of eight) I’ve come to understand that our potential as artists is fulfilled when we contribute to something greater than ourselves.

At its core, going to the theater and observing another human being has a meaningful and serious function in society. Because something happens when we watch someone else on stage. For a moment, we step into their shoes.

That act of stepping into someone else’s perspective is, in itself, an act of empathy. And I believe that the stage is one of the few remaining spaces in which this kind of shared human experience can still take place in real time.

Do you believe in the transformative power of art? How?

Yes, I do. I believe that experiencing a work of art, particularly in a live setting, can shift something within us. Sometimes in subtle, almost invisible ways. If watching a performance allows someone to step into another person’s perspective, they are actively practicing empathy. And empathy, I believe, is the basis for ethics. If my work can contribute, even in a small way, to encouraging this kind of reflection, then I believe it has fulfilled its purpose.

When you are working on a piece, what sources inspire you? Do dreams play a role in your pieces?

In a sense, I’m inspired by everything I experience: works of art, literature, music, personal encounters. Dreams don’t play a specific role, but everything I live filters into the work.

More fundamentally, though, my inspiration comes from my “why” — the reason I create. I believe we choreographers carry a responsibility. We’re given a space, a platform, and an audience. Hundreds (sometimes thousands) of people choose to sit in the dark and listen to what we have to say. That’s powerful. And with that power comes responsibility.

As I said earlier, I believe performance is about creating the conditions for empathy. That’s what drives my choices: what ideas to explore, what materials to use, and how the work takes shape. My decisions are always in service of that purpose.

When do you decide to give a title to a piece you are working on, if it already does not have one?

In my process, the title usually comes quite late. Ideally, it’s something that emerges once I’ve gotten to know the piece and understand what it wants to communicate. Titles can be important because they’re often the audience’s first encounter with the work. I like to use the title to guide the audience gently into how they might experience or interpret what they are about to see.

That said, practical realities often require that I provide a title long before the piece is ready due to marketing deadlines, subscriptions, and so on. That can be difficult, but I try to stay flexible.

Are there any artist or person whom you think influenced your art most? And if there is such an artist or person, who?

There are so many that it’s impossible to name just a few. My influences come from different fields, choreographers like Pina Bausch, visual artists like Marcel Duchamp, music producers like Rick Rubin, composers such as Arvo Pärt, and writers like Samuel Beckett. The list goes on.

I find inspiration in artists who are able to distill complex ideas into something essential and moving. Those who communicate something human and timeless in a unique way.

When you consider the current state of the world in every sense, what is the most important and urgent issue for you as an artist?

Once again, I return to empathy. If going to the theater can help someone connect with another human being even temporarily, it creates the conditions for empathy. And I believe empathy is at the heart of how we treat each other.

The more we can empathize, the more we recognize the humanity in others, the less capable we are of harming them. We become more tolerant, more understanding, more accepting of different points of view, more willing to listen, and more open to difference.

As an artist, I hope that through my work, I am helping audiences exercise this ability, this muscle of empathy. Even if that impact is small, it can ripple out into everyday life, influencing how people relate to others and the choices they make.

You create works for dance companies in different countries, from Italy to the UK, from Sweden to Germany, from the US to South Korea. You don't have an established dance company. So you don't have the comfort of working with dancers who know you and your style. However, we can see from your list of works that you work more closely with some companies. What are the difficulties or comforts, challenges or conveniences of creating a piece for dancers of an existing company?

It’s true that I don’t have the luxury of always working with the same team, but I do often collaborate with companies that offer remarkable support like skilled technicians, painters, carpenters, rehearsal directors, marketing department etc. All ready to contribute and bring a vision to life. That’s a privilege.

As an artist, I also find it enriching to travel, to work with different dancers and encounter different audiences and cultures. Each new environment offers fresh input and challenges me to adapt and grow.

Of course, my process is quite unorthodox, and adapting to it can be a challenge for dancers at first. But I’ve found that while the beginning is often demanding, the collaboration becomes incredibly rewarding. The dancers and teams always rise to the occasion, and together we build something meaningful.

I saw Leaning Tree, which you created for Dansk Danseteater, and admired the ideas you found to tell a story or a situation in many places. The atmosphere you create on stage by playing with perspective, perception and time contains many surprises and emotions for the audience. The piece doesn't have a dominant story, but you have created a narrative that has a trajectory that the audience can follow. Moments, situations and relationships are more dominant than the story itself. Unfortunately I haven't had the chance to see your other work, so if we take Leaning Tree as an example, how does the process of creation work?

My process is rooted in experimentation, trial and error. It often begins months or even years before rehearsals start. By the time I arrive in the studio, I usually have notebooks full of ideas, and the set design is already in place.

Once in the studio, we start exploring, testing, building small sketches, trying things out. It’s a process of generating a wide range of material and slowly refining it. We create dozens of short scenes, and eventually select those that feel most aligned with the concept and the emotional core of the work.

It’s a highly collaborative process. Everyone involved contributes ideas. We assign creative tasks and build material together, like assembling puzzle pieces. Once we identify the strongest material, we shape it into scenes, work on transitions, and gradually build the arc of the piece.

When I saw Leaning Tree, I thought that as a choreographer, a movement designer, you were flirting with magic and acrobatics, with the nouveau cirque genre. If I'm not mistaken, you are also working with a magician in Tempo, which you are currently working on and will premiere in August 2025. Could you tell us about your ideas on this subject, i.e. how do you see nouveau cirque and magical practices?

I wouldn’t say I have any particular connection to nouveau cirque or acrobatics. But one thing that might set my work apart is that I see choreography as something that goes beyond the body. I choreograph everything: movement, scenography, lighting, props. In the studio, I often explore how these elements interact. What happens when the set moves and interacts with the dancer? When light becomes part of the choreography and scenography? Sometimes, this leads to moments that feel surprising or even magical. But that’s simply the result of exploring the interaction between elements on stage.

If it feels like illusion, it’s not because I set out to create a trick, it’s because we’ve discovered something unexpected together in the process.

If I'm not mistaken, in a considerable number of your pieces, you also create the scenography and even the costumes. I think that designing these also brings your work closer to the Gesamtkunstwerk. What are your thoughts on this?

Yes, the scenography and costumes are very much integrated into the work. Often, they’re born at the same time as the concept and movement ideas. They are not separate—they’re part of the conceptual and emotional language of the piece.

So in that sense, yes, the works can be seen as Gesamtkunstwerk: a total artwork where multiple disciplines come together as one. But I don’t approach it that way intentionally.

My goal is simply to express the idea (the “why”) as clearly and effectively as possible. If bringing all these elements together helps achieve that, then that’s the direction I follow.

The music for Leaning Tree was composed especially for this project by Signe Lykke. I think the music is very much in the spirit of the piece, in fact we think it is one of the main elements that builds the atmosphere of the piece. I'm curious about the relationship with the composition and the composer during the creation process?

The original version of Leaning Tree was performed live with the Copenhagen Phil—60 musicians placed throughout the theater, embedded among the audience. Some were seated behind the spectators, others on the balconies, and some in the orchestra pit. This spatial arrangement created a deeply immersive experience, with the audience quite literally surrounded by sound and in close physical proximity to the musicians.

Our process was also quite unorthodox. I created the choreography first, entirely without music. Then Signe spent about six months composing the score, drawing inspiration from the structure, tone, and rhythm of the movement. Once her composition was complete, I revisited and edited the scenes again, refining the piece to respond more directly to the emotional and atmospheric layers the music brought. It was a true dialogue between movement and sound, with each informing the other.

[The Turkish version of this article and interview is published in unlimited.]