The screendance movie, created by Editta Braun & Menie Weissbacher LUVOS migrations leads the viewer to a journey in a seemingly familiar world, inhabited by unknown or invisible to the human eye creatures – hybrids between animals and plants. Impressive natural ladshafts invoke the sensation of wild nature, harmony and serene eternity. They take turns with anti utopian urban landscapes, carrying the feeling of the collapse of a civilisation, outlived by the automated constructions of its own industrialisation.

This journey shows us the documentary truthfulness, typical for the popular-science movies that reveal unknown habitats and their inhabitants, as well as the surrealism of science-fiction movies that look deep into the cosmos or time for other worlds or possible alternative versions of post or pre-civilized realities and ways of living.

The movie language is constructed with a classical calm montage rhythm, alternating close-up and wide exterior shots. For inhabiting the deserted nature and urban locations is used another classical technique, known from the early era of cinema – the double exposition. The Luvos are filmed on a green screen and then, in post production, added to the previously shot video or photographic images in the needed scale and number.

The dramaturgy of the movie consists of three parts. The first part / act is expected to be the longest. The viewer is invited to the specific parallel reality of this dance movie. In it we are introduced to the Luvos. They are peculiar creatures – half plants, half animals, constructed by intertwined, faceless, mainly female naked bodies and extremities. In the beginning, timidly and one by one, they begin to settle down in the deserted shores and welcoming beaches. Then, with a childish naivety, curiosity and playfulness they begin to explore the fresh green forests and streams, the crystal clear air, the frostiness and rowness of the mountains. Their journey slowly reaches the verge of the wilderness where they find abandoned buildings and architectural structures, remains of a past invasion. Debris from a civilisational failure, caused by the desire nature to be submissive to its ‘’reasonable’’ creation– the human.

The second act depicts a post apocalyptic picture. We see the Luvos entrapped in the hostility of the machines and the city. These extraordinary, playful, moving, gentle and vulnerable creatures seem lost, helpless and crippled, wandering around in search of an escape or salvation. 

The mass getaway from the merciless and toxic urban surroundings through the hassle of the thoroughfares at the end of the second act is a smooth transition into the final third part. It sums up and sublimes the author’s message. Once again we see the beautiful landscapes from the first part of the movie but this time they are inhabited with Luvos that have already migrated from the cities and are healing from their traumas and now live in sync with the surrounding environment. 

Editta Braun is a choreographer with an expressive theatrical style. She is a pioneer of contemporary dance in Austria and nowadays works also as a producer and director of theatre and film projects. She was born in 1958 in Salzkammergut and initially was  interested in classical ballet. After she graduated German literature and Sports science in Salzburg she spent time in New York and Paris where she studied contemporary dance and theatre. In 1982, in collaboration with Beda Precht, Editta founded the performing group ‘’Vorgänge’’ and later in 1989 it was transformed into ‘’Editta Braun Company’’ and  she’s been working intensively with it until now in Salzburg. Her performances were selected in festivals in Europe, Asia and Africa. Since 1996 Editta has worked closely with the musician Thierry Zaboitseff, whose compositions are the foundations of her art works. Over the years Braun has taught at universities in Linz and Salzburg, and around the world. In 2014 she won the International Award for Art and Culture in Salzburg.

Editta Braun’s choreographic signature is blending her artistic sense of humour with serious themes, theatricality and original visual movement images. At the centre of her creative research is the naked body and its transformations from a familiar icon, image and cliché into an abstraction of itself. The screendance movie „LUVOS migrations” (2022/2023) marks a nearly 40-year odyssey in getting to know the Luvos, or rather in creating them and the entire universe they inhabit. 

In 1985, during a creative residency in Senegal, the choreographer, together with the artists of “Vorgänge” created the dance miniature “Lufus”, which turned to be a sensation and won an award for choreography at the prestigious Bagnolet Festival in France in 1986. To this date, Editta Braun, in collaboration with composer Thierry Zaboitseff and the performers of  her company, continue to develop this extraordinary form of movement theatre in their LUVOSmove® series, taking it far beyond the boundaries of conventional contemporary dance. The five stage plays – „Luvos, vol.2“ (2001), „planet Luvos“ (2012), „Close up“ / „Close up 2.0“ (2015 и 2017), Fanghoumé (2019) and „Hydráos“ (2020), and the five short films “Hydrolákis” (2020) explore and build an original aesthetic of contemporary movement theatre, based on the manipulation and interweaving of female half-naked bodies, creating surprising images and illusions.

The result of this long-term research is the creation of a real Luvos ensemble, whose dancers are specialised in the specific dance technique and aesthetics of LUVOSmove®, which is constantly developing and enriching. The study of movement and its close intertwining with the sound environment leads to the formation of an original, specifically female form of musical theatre for the illusion of the body.