For the second year, we invite you to Sujets à Vif, these unexepected encounters at the Jardin de la Vierge, between writing and performance, where artists decide to work and build together a totally new itinerary. Bridges are laid out, planned, imagined between performers and writers coming from different backgrounds, from different artistic playgrounds, different from those they usually know or practise. Eight premieres, eight short shows, eight questionings, eight explorations: you will find here, choreography, theatre, music, circus, performance, all disciplines the Sacd covers and to whom once again opportunity is given to exchange and to mingle. We've kept in mind the magic moments of 2008; we hungrily expect surprises to come in 2009. This year again, under the amazed eye of the Blessed Virgin statue peeping over the whole stage - when the host does not decide to discreetly cover her face - , artists and writers from France, but also from Canada, Belgium, Switzerland or Lebanon will confront their own worlds. The Festival d'Avignon and the Sacd build up together these moments of diversity and crossing-over. I wish to stress here the joy of a friendly and perfect collaboration made up of common desires and the pleasure to plan together and expect the unexpected.
Jacques Fansten, president of the Sacd

Programme C

Miroir, miroir (Mirror, Mirror)

commissioned from Mélissa von Vépy

As a starting point for this visual and sound reverie, a mirror. An object that immediately induces a host of references to the cinema, stories, tales and mythologies, while generating formidable questions vis-à-vis oneself. The ordinary situation of being in front of the mirror becomes a voyage to the abyss that pushes our apprehension of the real to its limits. We can always try to save appearances: objectively, our reflection lies!

conception and interpretation Mélissa von Vépy, writer Angélique Willkie, composer and pianist Stephan Oliva

and

Trois quartiers (Three Quarters)

commissioned from Dominique Reymond

An actress (interpreter) is asked to take part in an artistic project that she would initiate. Used to interpreting works that are proposed to her, she doesn't really know how to react. She then turns to a director (conductor) so that he can reflect with her and an author (composer).

actress Dominique Reymond, director Gian Manuel Rau, writer Valérie Mréjen