L'Ange de la mort (The Angel of Death)

Artist of transformation, warrior of beauty, author, stage director, choreographer, visual artist, Jan Fabre is the heir of the Flemish primitives and of The Theatre of Cruelty. His fascination for the world of insects turns the art of dance into a entomological corporal exercise. In Antwerp, he works with the ensemble Troubleyn – which in old Dutch means “to remain faithful” – and deploys the art of the human species and of sensorial space. Jan Fabre was invited by the Avignon Festival to perform Je Suis Sang in the Cour d'Honneur in 2002 and in 2005, he will be the Festival's Associate Artist.


L'Ange de la mort (The Angel of Death)
As if he'd appeared from the depths of ages, emerged from time immemorial, out of a Van Eyck painting, choreographer William Forsythe dances in the corridors of an imaginary museum. Images of a natural history museum are projected on four video screens facing each other and he casts up propheties. A lighting box, placed in the middle of the screens, the body and voice of a woman scan the enigmatic and penetrating words of The Angel of Death, a monologue by Jan Fabre dedicated to William Forsythe. Accompanied by the psalmodic melodies
of saxophonist Éric Sleichim, the outstanding Ivana Jozic dances a resurrection. A hugely vital yet macabre dance where the blue angel of metamorphosis passes, just like a demiurge As if under a bell-jar, the frenzied or piercing movements find consonances between the human and animal worlds, articulating her limbs like mandibles. This “warrior of beauty” struggles with herself. Somewhere between an anatomy lesson and a poetry class, this snake, chameleon or beetle woman dances in honour of life, in honour of dance. “I glide and I dance, it's the only thing I know how to do, let me dance.” Awake or asleep, somewhere between the two, Jan Fabre directs an ode to acceptance of the cycle of life.

Conception, text and direction : Jan Fabre
cast : Ivana Jozic and the participation of William Forsythe in the video
choreography : Jan Fabre, Ivana Jozic
live music : Éric Sleichim

production : Troubleyn (Anvers)
coproduction : deSingel (Anvers)
avec la participation : du ministère de la Communauté flamande
texte publié par : l'Arche éditeur