Questioning the transmission and sustainability of art through extreme physical experimentation.

One of Jan Martens' representative work, <THE DOG DAYS ARE OVER>, defines dancers as 'pure performers striving for perfection', examining the essence of the performer through intensely demanding choreography.
In the work, dancers are defined as pure artists pursuing perfection. Subjected to a complex, mathematical, repetitive and exhausting choreography executed in forced uniformity, the eight dancers ultimately slip up. And then the masks of the “performers” fall, revealing the bare faces of “human” beings.
When it premiered in 2014, <THE DOG DAYS ARE OVER>, with its radical form, physical intensity, and collective execution, provided an opportunity to re-examine perspectives on dancers, choreographers, audiences, and even cultural policy at the time. Ten years later, these questions are still relevant within contemporary social and political contexts.

<THE DOG DAYS ARE OVER 2.0> is a reinterpretation of the previous work, restaged with a new generation of dancers. The work calls fundamental questions to the stage, such as when a work becomes a canon, how dance heritage should be passed on, what role recreating an existing piece can play to bring sustainability to the performing arts, and how original creators and performers can share their experiences and values with the next generation. The performance encourages the audience to go beyond the passive act of watching and deeply reflect on these issues.
Jan Martens emphasizes that the experiences and perspectives of the artistic team who premiered the work in 2014 should be actively reflected in this new work, and that their contributions should be recognized. This goes beyond a simple re-staging—it becomes an exploration of how dance heritage is passed on. Elements such as the premiere performance's duration, repetitive structure, and jumps were reexamined and adjusted with the new cast, while the knowledge and experience accumulated by the original cast served as valuable assets for the new generation.
<THE DOG DAYS ARE OVER 2.0> expands the meaning of sustainability and co-creation within a performance, establishing itself as an important milestone among works focused on exhaustion and repetition.