Here at Bozar, you’re presenting your performances as part of a programme that also features the exhibition Edith Dekyndt x Cristóbal Balenciaga. The Fabric Decides. What strikes you about Dekyndt’s work?

Darius Dolatyari-Dolatdoust: Her use of textiles in space, particularly their monumental and abstract quality. In today’s capitalist and patriarchal world, textile art is still often associated with women, even though it addresses much broader themes: everyday life, the home and the living environment. This relates to my own interest in the links between set design, architecture and costume: regardless of scale, such objects protect, frame and transform the body.

How has your relationship with clothing changed over the course of your career?

Darius Dolatyari-Dolatdoust: I originally studied clothing as an object to be made and sold, before moving on to sculpture, then choreography and performance. Today, I am particularly interested in the costume collections at the Théâtre national de Bruxelles. Rather than producing new pieces, I want to bring existing garments to life. A dance costume undergoes an almost extreme process of activation. The choreography is already embedded in its design: the garment accompanies, extends or enhances movement. What interests me is precisely how the costume becomes a choreographic proposition directed at the body and the dancer.

So how does the costume become part of the choreography?

Darius Dolatyari-Dolatdoust: Costume has always been a means of transforming the body. It can even take us beyond the human form, turning us into hybrid creatures. As the body disappears beneath the garment, the way we walk and move changes.

It also allows us to toy with identities – particularly queer identities – and to borrow from animal behaviour. For example, in Flags Parade, I explored birds’ courtship displays and the role of plumage in seductive rituals. In fact, their physical characteristics enable them to communicate through their bodies.

So clothing doesn’t just change how we move: it also conveys meaning.

Darius Dolatyari-Dolatdoust: Yes, it’s a true dialogue. I asked the performers I work with: Does the costume make us move, or do we make the costume move? I think we’re too human not to exercise control over the costume, but the question is also whether we can sometimes simply embrace it and surrender to the movements it suggests.

Clothing also influences us through its meaning. A skirt makes us move differently from trousers, and each conveys a different message. Clothes reveal something about our era, social relationships and the groups we belong to. They therefore not only shape the body but also tell us something about the person wearing them.

What is DRESSING about?

Darius Dolatyari-Dolatdoust: DRESSING is an extremely long process of layering clothing. It begins with a hybrid, almost insect-like body that gradually becomes more human as it is dressed. The costume becomes both a living sculpture and a covering for the body. Eventually, its elements form three standing silhouettes. It’s as though animals had dressed up as humans, since the only way to be human today seems to be to march like soldiers. In a way, the human condition seems foolish compared with that of other species.

There’s something rather funny about it – it’s already present in mata!, albeit much more subtly – and something burlesque and grotesque about the transformation, which was largely inspired by Bruegel’s paintings and his creatures that blend different species. Another striking feature is that everything is red: the body grows progressively redder until it becomes a sort of monolith of colour.

In mata!, you use the traditional matador costume as your starting point. What did you want to transform?

Darius Dolatyari-Dolatdoust: This traditional costume has remained virtually unchanged since the 19th century. To learn how it’s made, we visited a sastrería in Madrid. I followed the costume’s original pattern but made it from felt, which is the exact opposite of the traditional fabric: instead of shining and reflecting light, felt absorbs it. I wanted to bring the animal – the sheep – back into this character, whose original role is to kill animals, and blur the lines between bull and matador.

The matador also embodies a particular kind of masculinity, intrinsically linked to the costume: a broad chest, jacket, very tight trousers, ballet flats and tights – all of which would be considered distinctly feminine today. This is why we talk about ‘drag kings’ and the idea of performing gender: exaggerating a form of masculinity, playing with it and subverting this character on stage.

This is the first time you’ve presented your work in Brussels. What does it mean to you?

Darius Dolatyari-Dolatdoust: This is especially important to me, having studied at the Beaux-Arts and La Cambre. I’ve often worked in Flanders, but this is the first time I’m showing my performances in Brussels. I’m incredibly happy to be here.