You're a biologist, and on more than one occasion you've said you're almost by chance in the dance world. How was this encounter between dance and you?

I was doing rhythmic gymnastics when I started studying in biology school. In the second year I met the New Dance within the Contemporary Dance with the Moare Danza Association. I started studying release and improvisation techniques, while I was working in the plant physiology laboratory on mycorrhiza studies at the Faculty. I ended up specializing in ecosystem and population dynamics, and I decided to dive into the improvisation techniques that I started studying outside of the academic environment. The curiosity and the desire to know the sources led me to the outside, in a youth that is time to leave. Florence, Amsterdam and New York were the perfect places to continue learning for two years thanks to the financial support received. Now that I think, my way of approaching dance and choreography has always been very related to the dynamics of the population, the tensions within a group, the listening ability, the mechanisms of action and reaction, the management between order and disorder…

Are the Bilbao BAD festival and the Donostia Theatre Fair the only opportunities today for contemporary dance to reach the public?

You cannot speak of contemporary dance programming in the Basque Country without the designation of the La Foundry room. Today, in addition to the BAD festival, we must highlight the stage programming of La Foundry, Artium, the proposals that are offered both in the hall of Leioa and in Mugatxoan, among others. On the other hand, let us think that in the 1980s there was a more advanced, fun and dangerous offer than the current stage programming, both in dance and in theatre. Nowadays, the programming of contemporary dance in the Basque Country is, in general, poor and restricted. Nothing is up to date. It's totally homogenizing, that is, it offers a unique view of contemporary dance, and today very different things are being done in the name of dance. Many programmers use the subject of the public: that the public is not prepared, that contemporary dance has a reduced audience, etc. to justify their boring schedules. But it's a lie. The problem of the public is general, in theatres, cinemas, libraries… The digital age has changed a lot the relationship with the screen, the stage, the communication, the time. In fact, I would say that many creators nowadays dedicated to choreography are immersed in these great “paradigms”, proposing varied and interesting proposals to the public. In the contemporary scene, many works are emerging that escape from the “homogenizing approach” that we said before: proposals designed to be few public, designed to be many public, made for the differentiated public, in the black box, in the white, in the red, in the street; through excursions, colloquia and readings, over the internet, by movies… The current, varied, contemporary dance dynamics … should not be immersed

What is the relationship between theater and dance? What just happens in the same space? What is the relationship between movement and the word?

Both are performing arts, so they use knowledge and scene codes. In a way, they use the same machinery when they are offered inside the theater: telones, lighting, stage, armchair, entrance hall, public front, moment of opening doors, the audience when lighting lights and starting the function… They are brothers and sisters. Dance would be a little sister in this game of metaphors, and being a little sister, it's freer, lighter in abstraction and imagination, more promiscuous: it has a more pronounced tendency to square with audiovisual arts, cinema, poetry, music or circus arts.
Let's not forget that choreography is a form of writing, a way of writing with the body in space and in time. On the other hand, because the word is a sound, it's a movement, and because sense is what causes movement. Movement, body, writing, choreography, word, sense, sound, image… are the ingredients of dance language. The relationships between these components can be very different, therein lies the diversity of works being carried out in the dance environment; and in any case, these relationships are complex, it would give for several theses.

Does dance need music? Can you dance in silence? Is that the metaphor of the dance situation in Euskal Herria, which is done silently?

Yes, yes, dance can be done in silence and in all slowness. Imagine a silent, long dance. Dance would be impossible. John Cage tried to make music of silence and came to the conclusion that it was impossible (we would always reach the sound of his heartbeat and the dance of the movement).
More than a metaphor for the work that is done in silence, moving, silencing, I would use the work metaphor to explain the state of dance in Euskal Herria and someone has intentionally given each other ...

In the Azala Space there are different creators. What are the objectives and tasks of this project? What are you doing now?

Azala is a place of encounter and exchange between artists, creators, activists and thinkers. Although the epicenters of space are dance and performing arts, their expansive waves cross with naturalness and promiscuity other artistic disciplines, such as performative arts, the arts of the body... The space aims to create the right conditions for the processes of research and creation for the artists in residence, to
generate times of autonomy and freedom from experimentation, exchange, practice and critical reflection, to produce knowledge. It also seeks connections and links between creators, thinkers, the public and the locals, with the aim of enriching the artistic, cultural and social ecosystem that surrounds us. It is a project of initiative and private management, with few resources – scarce staff and scarce economy – but with a good connection. Eman is a project he gives, but in return he demands an active and sustainable commitment for the people who receive them, both with space and with the environment.Creative
work and research rooms, workshops, laboratories, seminars, meetings, celebrations, open days, walks… are some of the activities that can be carried out in Azala. It's an open house, a temporary shelter, a place full of opportunities to be able to influence and get impacts. An idea of participation and intervention.

What do you think about the training of the new dancers? Are there opportunities to learn to dance and develop creativity in the Basque Country itself?

On the front page, for example, we want to work on the concepts of education and training. Space develops an educative line understood as a metabolic process, both individual and collective. Training-assimilation-metabolism - transformation. We believe in collective research, in the self-regulation capacity of the group, as well as in the collaboration between practice and theory. To do so, we organize workshops, laboratories and seminars.