Femina

Michele Abbondanza comes from Carolyn Carlson's Venetian experience at Teatro La Fenice in the early 1980s, co-founded the group Sosta Palmizi in 1984 and met Antonella Bertoni in Paris, working with Carolyn Carlson. In the early 1990s, they founded the Abbondanza/Bertoni Company, recognised as one of the most prolific artistic realities on the Italian scene, which combines the creation of shows with training and research in contemporary dance theatre. As guest choreographers, they create choreographies for: the Teatro dell'Opera di Roma, the Aterballetto company; they work with directors: M. Baliani, N. Garella, R. Guicciardini and with musicians: John Surman, Steve Lacy, Michel Portal, Barre Phillips; they participate in Bernardo Bertolucci's film Io ballo da sola ('95) and are among the protagonists of the choreographies created for Vieni via con me, a programme by Fabio Fazio and Roberto Saviano, broadcast on Rai Tre (2010). They sign and perform more than thirty creations; in 1996 they won the Casina prize for choreography and the Danza&Danza prize as "best performers", they won the ETI-Stregagatto prize in 1998 with the show Romanzo d'infanzia, which has exceeded 600 performances in its four versions: Italian, English, French, Portuguese.  In 2017 with the performance La morte e la fanciulla they won the Danza&Danza prize as "best Italian performance", and in 2021 they won the UBU prize for "best dance performance" with Doppelgänger. In 2008 they created Scuola d'Azione, a physical and theoretical space for the transmission of their teaching, at the Teatro alla Cartiera in Rovereto, where the company is in residence; they practice and teach Zen.Since 1996, Michele Abbondanza has been teaching dance at the Giorgio Strehler Theatre School, directed by Carmelo Rifici (Piccolo Teatro di Milano).