Director of the Centre Chorégraphique National de Montpellier since 1994, Mathilde Monnier's first solo piece was in 1988 and had a surrealist touch. After a foray into jazz writing with Louis Sclavis, Chinoiserie and Face Nord (1991), she took a serious look at her writing process, and started examining more closely the body as well as spaces linked to the notion of community. At the same time as her dance pieces, she devoted some of her time to other activities - some with people in Africa, others in Montpellier with autistic people – which added new dimensions to her work. She created Pour Antigone (1993) with African and Western dancers, while L'Atelier en Pièces (1996) is a reflection on proximity, the body and confinement. From the issue of differences to questions about society, her research delves into internal disorder to the limits of madness as in Déroutes based on Lenz by Georg Büchner (2003), or Publique (2004), a dance performance by women which is an examination of identity and the rapport with rock music via that of P.J. Harvey. At the Avignon Festival, Mathilde Monnier has already presented Pudique Acide/Extasis in 1986, Ainsi de Suite in 1992, L'Atelier en Pièces in 1996 and Les Lieux de Là in 1999.
There is a gayness in this choreographic work by Mathilde Monnier, which multiplies the number of spaces whence the dance emerges. On three stages of different sizes, the performers in small groups carry out strange rituals and work in sequence with forms that are chaotic, unbridled or else slower, delicate, or subtle. Their gestures release energy in three forms – crude, gratuitous violence; desire and its' constant movement, its' many faces and bonds, a relaxed state in the fluidity of gestures, receptive to or in contact with others. If we accept that the history of humankind is primarily a history of bodies, which express thought, evolution and movement, we can understand why Mathilde Monnier, whose pieces are mostly about the community and different expressions of "living together", remains attached to the meaning of gesture in order to choreograph real life. The team of script-writer Stéphane Bouquet, turntable composer, eRikm, the choreographer and the performers make a remarkable homage to movement in what is most liberating - a revelation of different forms of change. frère&sœur (brother&sister) is about siblings. Usually referred to in the family context, this particular relationship between beings is this time a reflection of society. Destiny, an expression of existence, unfolds after a series of experiences, or things that have occurred. The writing is organic, chiselled out of the abstract, and ties this study-dance around an original concept of our relationship with the world, "one destiny of many" and its' possible outcomes. It is a dance about remembering and sharing experiences, a performance about generosity.
Distribution
Choreography : Mathilde Monnier
Music : eRikm
Artists associated to the creation :
Dance : Jérôme Andrieu, Trisha Bauman, Davy Brun, Benoît Caussé, Yoann Demichelis, Herman Diephuis, Julien Gallée-Ferré, Natacha Kouznetsova, Micha Lescot, I-Fang Lin, Joel Luech, Ayelen Parolin
Scenography : Annie Tolleter
Lighting : Eric Wurtz
Costumes : Dominique Fabrègue
Scenario : Stéphane Bouquet
Production
Production : Festival d'Avignon, Centre Georges Pompidou - les Spectacles vivants, Festival d'Automne à Paris, Maison de la Culture d'Amiens, Théâtre des Salins - Scène nationale de Martigues, deSingel (Anvers), Tanz im August - Internationales Tanzfest Berlin (Berlin), Centre chorégraphique national de Montpellier Languedoc-Roussillon