Retour en Avant / Past Forward Biennale de la Danse Lyon - France

Comment la violence des conflits armés nousrend-elle étranger ?Quelle sensibilité naît de ces violences ?C’est la question qu’abordera ce projet itinérantsuivant les pas d’un voyage effectué il ya plus de 50 ans. »Rachid OuramdaneInfo +Coproduction BiennaleChorégraphe invité par le Ballet de l’Opérade Lyon à l’occasion de la Biennale 2006Rachid OuramdaneRachid Ouramdane’s company L’A. is a forumfor artistic reflection on contemporary identities,and which accords central importance toencountering the other.His projects focus on the singular. Each of hispieces explores the construction of the affectsand imaginative realms of people he meets.They are developed through discovering eachperson’s singularities; in each piece, dialogueis treated differently. The ever-present videofootage is used as an extension of the other, asa way into their mind. Images create a dialoguebetween the person and their doubles.Ouramdane uses these conceits to capturethe subjectivity and imaginative realm of theother. He has conducted many projects on howcontemporary identities are constructed amidthe modernisation of our societies and amid thereconfigurations caused by the upheaval of ourcultural geographies. This exploration was givena particularly acute focus in the 2004 solo Lesmorts pudiques, a sort of self-portrait devisedfrom fragments of stories gathered from theinternet. It marked the start of a series of solosin various pieces.In 2005, after several work stays in Brazil,Ouramdane created Cover, a four-solo piece forBrazilian artists. At the same time, he developeda major partnership with Bonlieu-Scène Nationaled’Annecy, France; he stages most of his newworks at this leading performing arts centre. In2006, he created Superstars for Ballet de l’OpéraNational de Lyon, and Un garçon debout, a soloperformed by the writer and stage director PascalRambert. Currently, at Rambert’s invitation,Ouramdane is associate artist at CDN Théâtre deGennevilliers. Through the projects he devises,he feeds his identity-related questions into thereality of this Paris suburb; in addition, collaboratingwith the theatre’s team, hedevelops new forms of encounterspecific to each new work, whilealso weaving them into the town’s everydaylife. He created Surface de réparationfor eight young sportspeople in Gennevilliers;the piece analyses the sporting gesture to revealits intimate dimension, which bonds these adolescentsto the sport they practise.In parallel with his creative work, RachidOuramdane is developing his teaching activities.He is regularly invited to lead artistic-researchworkshops and to moderate meetings betweeninternational groups of artists in France and furtherafield (Russia, Romania, Netherlands, Brazil,United States, etc.).Loin… / 2008 creationRachid Ouramdane’s latest solo explores thetraces of the Indochina war and the havoc itwreaked on identities; it soaks up history tobetter reinvent it. The dance – shifting, tortuous,surprising – shadows the changes peopleunderwent, reaching deep into the dark andluminous labyrinth of memory.“Travelling often provides opportunities to revisitoneself, to take stock of one’s identity – or identities,rather. Those that we inherit, and informhow we see others; and those that we project toourselves, and try to liberate. Travel helps explorethe strata of identity – whether national, economic,ethnic, minority, cultural, media, sexual,psychological or affective – which are rearrangedevery time we go on a journey. Our various facesmust therefore often negotiate between the legacyof the past and an identity being constructedin the present. During these movements, thesense of being a foreigner arises. Our embraceddifferences and scant knowledge of elsewherecreate a place where we can rethink ourperspective. My next choreographic project willrevolve around this crossroads of thought. On arecent trip to Vietnam and Cambodia, anotherway of probing this sense of foreignness occurredto me. While discussing the violence andconflict that shook the region, I recalled pagesfrom my father’s military papers – he had operatedin what was then Indochina. During thediscussion I realised that, because of my Frenchnationality, I was seen as a child of a former coloniser,whereas my father’s bond with Indochinaderived from the legacy of another colonisation– by France in my father’s native Algeria.How does the violence of armed conflict makeus foreign?What sensibility does this violence yield?These are the questions addressed in this travellingproject, which retraces a journey made morethan fifty years ago.”Extra info:Co-produced by the BiennaleOuramdane was Ballet de l’Opéra de Lyon’sguest choreographer at the 2006 Biennale65