“I’m a powder,” he says with his unmistakable Spanish accent. He has a bright look and a quick, undisguised laugh. She is restless and seems well up for challenges. It is far from Madrid, the city where she was born and grew up and where she has her residence. Strange, but not that strange. In Buenos Aires she feels at home and the work that brought her here has her fascinated.
Africa Guzman He has an important career in the world of dance. Is Ballet Director of the Stable Ballet of the Teatro Colón. She was First Dancer of the National Dance Company, Spain, under the direction of Maya Plisétskaya and Nacho Duato, and of the Nederlands Dans Theater. She is the director of the África Guzmán Dance Project and the África Guzmán Ballet School. In addition, she is a choreographer and guest teacher in important companies around the world.
She began taking classes at the age of three at the África Guzmán Ballet School, created and directed by her mother of the same name. She later graduated with honors from the Royal Professional Conservatory of Dance and the Royal Academy of Dance.
“I grew up playing in my mother’s dance school. We are five brothers and we all started with ballet without wanting to, it was part of our home. I loved it, I had the conditions and here I am with a successful career,” he remembers.
And he says: “My mother is super demanding, very perfectionist. But also a super generous person and teacher. She instilled in me the love for this profession, the values. I was very naughty, a restless person, I’m still a dusty person, but I have also given her a lot of satisfaction. We are very similar. She has already come several times in the year or so that I have been here, the last one for Swan Lake. ‘What satisfaction I get from you,’ she tells me.”
News: At 16 he entered the National Dance Company, which was directed by Maia Plitzétskaya and later by Nacho Duato. What memories do you have?
Africa Guzmán: barbarians It was immense luck, shortly after entering they began to give me more prominent roles and Maia herself chose me for my first leading role when I was 19 years old. He was a person who accompanied you continuously. He did classes with us, he sat next to you, he talked to you, he explained to you. She was super close and empathetic. I knew I was living history. Maia was a world star. She danced a lot of The Death of the Swan with us and I saw all the performances. He was a spectacle, he had a master’s degree. Greetings, I said what personality, what power, what greatness and what simplicity at the same time. For me it was a luxury. After Maia, Nacho Duato came in as director, bringing a more neoclassical language. I had enormous versatility from the beginning and I was very good at language. In addition, important choreographers also came. I was a prima ballerina and a world opened up to me. The level was exceptional.
News: What was your professional path like? How much did it cost you to get to that very first level?
Guzman: If I’m honest, I’m grateful to life because with how demanding and expensive this profession is, if I look back, I think I’ve been quite lucky. But I am also very hard-working, you don’t want to know to what extent, very perfectionist and very demanding of myself. And I think that in the end the secret is that. I love this profession, so for me coming to work is coming to play, to have fun. I remember getting up very early and being an hour or so before class started.
News: Beyond the technical resources and the work itself, what does it take to become a first dancer?
Guzman: Just to be a dancer. I always say that eighty percent is the head. I mean you have to be smart to learn a few steps and understand what the body, the profession and so on require. But being able to have discipline, being able to endure what the profession demands, there are people who are incapable of spending eight hours in a studio, enduring a rehearsal, the physical demand, the pressure that all this entails. You have to be smart somehow to be able to handle it and keep up.
News: What did you have to leave aside for your career?
Guzman: I don’t know if I had to leave it aside, my life has not been conventional. Maybe I missed birthdays, family moments, because I was on tour in Japan and had someone close’s wedding. Well, those things did make me sad. But it didn’t occur to me not to go on the tour. And at the same time I was lucky to be in Japan. They are things that life gives you. I went from here to there, to the big theaters, that filled me. So, what have I left behind or what have I benefited from?
News: Were you able to start a family? Did he get married?
Guzman: I don’t have children, so I have been able to move freely. I lead a life of suitcases. I haven’t gotten married either. Yes I have had my partners, my relationships.
News: In some films the world of dance has been painted as a place of envy, jealousy, and competition. How much truth is there in that?
Guzman: I get sick with that. They draw a horrible image of the dance with all the beauty there is. Sometimes, some twisted things come out that tell me what reality these people live in. That there is rivalry, that there is jealousy, of course, that exists, as in any profession. Now, that evil, those levels, is horrifying. It makes me so angry. When I saw “The Black Swan” I left the theater very angry. What’s that?
News: You have your own project. What exactly is the África Guzmán Dance Project?
Guzman: It is a bridge between the academic and the professional. A training program where students have personalized attention, work with high-level teachers and choreographers, the classes are more active, the rehearsals, the stage experience. If you are there for a couple of years, with that experience you are taking away, it is the same as if you had been in a professional company.
News: What did you feel when Julio Bocca, Artistic Director of the Ballet Stable of the Teatro Colón, called you to be the ballet director?
Guzman: Well, imagine. My structured life, I was going wonderfully, happy, and suddenly this bomb. Julio Bocca and Colón, I couldn’t say no. He called me one night in Spain a year before and told me to think about it. It baffled me, but I thought it was wonderful. The cocktail was an explosion, something that could work very well, I was sure, a wonderful mix.
News: What reality did you encounter and how is the experience?
Guzman: I’m having a great time. There were more difficult or better moments in the company, but right now it is super committed and I think we are reaching points of understanding. I think the company has a lot of history that weighs on it, for good things, for bad things, so it always has a bit of misgivings. That was the first impression. It was not so easy, but I think the progress that has been made, with their efforts as well, of having understood that no one wanted to go against anything but the other way around, valuing the institution that it is. This theater is wonderful, everything it has. There has been a phenomenal first season and this season we have six programs. The progress of the company, people say, is seen in the day-to-day work.
News: What is your specific job?
Guzman: A little bit of everything. Teaching, being at rehearsals, supporting Julio, managing the day to day, the year, the season with him, and staying in charge when he is not there. I think big steps are being made.
News: What is it like to work with Bocca?
Guzman: It is a very good experience. I met him when we were dancing, and then over the years, as we were both teachers, we coincided as judges in some competitions. He also summoned me several times to teach classes as a guest teacher when he was in charge of the SODRE ballet in Montevideo. There we saw that we had the same way of understanding dance, of working. Now, I have discovered another Julio in everyday life, which has a huge human part. He gives me a care that makes me be very close to him. My commitment has been huge and he cares both inside and outside of work. He asks me if I got home, let’s go to the supermarket. He wants me to be well, but at the same time he demands a lot. I love that precision with which he wants to do everything, that everything meshes perfectly in all areas. I calm him down in some things and he relies on me in others.
News: What is your life like in Buenos Aires?
Guzman: I tell you the truth, I don’t have much life. From my house to Colón and from Colón to my house, because this demands a lot. It is a city where I feel good, because of the Argentine as well. It is very similar to Madrid, the people are charming, we are very similar, that openness of welcome. I have people who feel like family, and thanks to them my stay is much more pleasant. There is always someone who wants to help you. Everyone is open to giving you a hand.
News: Are you happy with the person you are and the life you built?
Guzman: Yes, life has put me on a path and I think I have been lucky enough to perform it satisfactorily, and it has given me very nice opportunities, like being here today.
