In 1968, eleven Persian onagers were brought from Iran to Israel. The onager is a species in the subgenus belonging to many different species of wild ass (kind of like a small, wild donkey). The herd of onagers was released into the wildlife reserve ‘Yotvata’ and adapted with great success. The process of reintroducing them to the wild began in 1982 near Ein Saharonim in the Ramon Crater, and within a decade 14 pairs of onagers were released into an area covering 3,500 square kilometers. As a result of natural reproduction and additional releases of onagers that were brought in from the wildlife reserve, the wild population flourished and the onager reintroduction project was crowned with success. As of the beginning of 2016, the onager population is estimated to be upwards of 300 individuals. Their area of distribution spans from the northern Negev Mountains to Faran.
The onager is the symbol of rebellion and freedom. It is a symbol of unspoiled nature – hence its name in Hebrew, pere, which can also mean “savage” or “beast.” The onager is wild, and man has never been able to tame it, despite countless attempts.
When we think of wildness, we sometimes think of unbridledness, or a lack of restraint. In fact, life in the desert requires abiding by its laws: a correct and measured use of energy, listening, reduction. Freedom is created from seeing the space and knowing the conduct within it. Wildness requires connection to a natural place within us, attentive to the nature of things around us, the need to design and control prevents us from the simplicity of contact in our lives. The wild breathes relaxation and because of this it is soft, alert, and agile.
In the dance show Wild Ones there is a lot of working with hair. The hair stands as a metaphor for wildness and freedom, as opposed to surrendering to the dictates of fashion or cultural social pressure, plucking hair as an act of painful and unpleasant aesthetics and accompanied by a feeling of disgust for the natural, when and why we remove armpit hair and shave our legs. And, for those of us who are men, when do we shave our facial hair, and how does this connect to our culture, our religion and the social environment in which we live? Do we have a choice? Or do we choose to tame ourselves, much like our attempts to tame the wild? From the soles of our feet, to the movement of our bodies, to the hair on our heads? The hair on our heads can express our emotional feelings and our world view; it is linked to our free choice and to the identity we adopt for ourselves as much as it is to the loss of control experienced in hair loss, almost as if it were a disease or punishment.
The show is also about spirit. The ‘spirit’ present in the show brings the imperceptible flow of air, much like our own spirit, between the gentleness, the caress, and the calming, to the scattering, the shattering, the storm, the same spirit that can uproot a bone. Its soaring nature is the one that brings the flow of relief and comfort – and this is how we, with our own nature, collect, disperse, find, lose, laugh, cry, observe our powers and insight, and release the whip of oppression.
The work is accompanied by personal writings and a soundtrack inspired by the poetry of Marjan Vahdat, an Iranian singer, which is performed by the band Sahale.
Wild Ones was created in the studio in the dance company’s new home in the small city of Sderot, which is one of the communities situated close to the border with Gaza. Undoubtedly, this is a wounded, painful, sad area that longs for compassion – not an obvious location for the development of an art center. The choice of the Persian song, like the choice to lay the roots of a new center for movement in Sderot, stems from a deep belief that the point of pain must be reached in order for change to begin without being threatened.