The audience becomes a choir, listening to a drying river.
It is said that during colonial times, in the Bolivian Andean Plateau, the river Desaguadero and its uncontrollable nature were demonized as ‘the Devil’ by colonial settlers. Since then, the river has dried out, turning from water to salt after centuries of continuous extraction. Reimagining the Devil not as a destructive force but as the river’s guardian, The River and The Devil explores resilience and the remnants of fragmented histories. The river has turned into broken pieces, hiding and moving towards us unannounced.
Combining dance, fiction, collective storytelling, and a soundscape by Vica Pacheco, the piece evokes a sense of living among ruins, asking what remains when a river disappears. Mythological figures and spirits that once protected the river linger as echoes in this haunting meditation on loss and endurance.
Trigger warning:
During the performance, the audience is invited to partake in the reading of a text. Each audience member chooses between taking part, just listening, or other forms yet to be discovered together.
About
Paula Almiron, born in Buenos Aires and based in Brussels, works at the intersection of choreography and writing, exploring the ongoing intra-action between the social, the spiritual and the geological realms.
Since 2019, her work has focused on "water choreographies," with projects like Always Coming Hole (2021) and The River and The Devil (2025). Paula collaborates with Wouter De Raeve on I Build My Language With Rocks in Brussels' Northern Quarter and co-coordinated M33, a space supporting local neighborhood movements, while curating Swamp Sacrifices, a program centered on non-productivity and the Brussels swamp.
Paula works as a dancer, choreographer, mentor, and outside eye in diverse contexts and has collaborated with artists like Louise Vanneste and David Weber-Krebs, with her work showcased at venues such as Bâtard Festival, Veem House for Performance, Kanal-Centre Pompidou, Kunsthalle Zurich, and Munar Arte in Buenos Aires, among others.
images Bo Vloors
