A strange, suggestive pop choreographic performance that deconstructs classical ballet. Programmed as part of the EUROPALIA festival, which is honouring Spain in this upcoming edition. Sugar Island is a place. An island, a living organism, a dance. It is the system of ballet cracked open, a strange connection of familiarity and mystery embodied in the same source. Sugar Island is on the other side. Far away. Deep down. Sugar Island is earth, muscle, ligament, golden curtain, lights. It's classical, artificial, pop, weird. It's the unsettling feeling of being far too awake... Following on from her previous works, Madrid-based choreographer Cuqui Jerez has created a piece based on the artistic process of “suspension of meaning.” She attempts to question and deconstruct our automatisms as spectators, inviting us to enjoy new aesthetics and contemplative experiences. Blurring the boundary between presentation and representation, she dissolves this dichotomy to invent a place on the surface of reality. After Magical and Elastic at the Kaaitheater in 2022, Cuqui Jerez's work is once again being presented in Belgium, much to our delight. Originally trained in classical dance and fluent in its language, she now seeks to broaden the notion of dance and choreography. Thirty years after her initial training, she is taking a critical look at the discipline through the lens of her choreographic practice, contemporary languages and a political dimension, codes which she puts in tension with other ways of making and conceiving dance.