Eva Yerbabuena

EVOLVING WITH INTENTION

INa 2002 review in The New Yorker, dance writer Arlene Croce covered the two-year-old New York Flamenco Festival, in which Eva Yerbabuena was the closing act. “The great thing was her soleá, in which … she seemed to touch on every known facet of human experience. She swung; she scooped the rhythms out of the floor; she let us have a little fun, with the result that when, eventually, she took the plunge — straightened up, braced herself, and dove into flamenco’s duende, or soul — we believed her and followed her. She made my life pass before my eyes, and she did it without any fuss about modernism.” “You make it modern by revealing yourself,” Yerbabuena told The New York Times, “not with embellishments. What’s difficult is revealing yourself.”

Yerbabuena is one of the biggest stars in flamenco and has been for decades. She will be performing at the Festival Flamenco Alburquerque on Thursday, June 16. Her website describes the dance works she has performed over the years in highly poetic, almost opaque language. So were the answers she sent to questions posed by Pasatiempo.

PASATIEMPO: How have you evolved as a flamenco artist over the years? YERBABUENA: It takes a lot of attention, involvement, and intention. There are things in life that you cannot change. You learn to adapt without giving up your beliefs, values, and ways of feeling.

PASA: If you were going to tell the story of your soleá, what would it be? YERBABUENA: I was stone and I lost my center. And I was thrown into the sea and after a long time, I came to find my center. That is my soleá.

PASA: What did Pina Bausch teach you as a dancer? YERBABUENA: How important it is to have intuition and not to doubt yourself.

PASA: What is the difference between technique and artistry? YERBABUENA: The technique is the tool to make you feel artistic when you are born with that gift. It is also possible to be born with the gift of being an artist and not be able to develop it, due to a lack of knowledge of the methodology to work through technique.

PASA: Do you hear the guitar differently because you are married to a guitarist? YERBABUENA: I don’t know how I would hear it if I were not married to a guitarist, but I defend it by all means and I highly value its contribution, since it is at the service of cante and dance. It is not only him as a creator, but also as a whole. And it is true that between Paco [Jarana] and me, we have created a methodology and a special way of working on the creations. In short, I listen to the guitar with a lot of love.

PASA: When you teach young dancers, what is it they most need to hear from you? YERBABUENA There is a generalized doubt, which is to know my sources of creation.

PASA: What other art forms inform your dancing? YERBABUENAB: All of them.

PASA: Do you still consider yourself shy? YERBABUENA: Always. I’m still shy but I have acquired the ability to cope with it. ◀