L'Art de vivre

“The idea of a choreographic dialogue between Sylvain Prunenec and Guillaume Drouadaine came to us during the rehearsals for a show by Olivier Martin Salvan, which includes the Catalyse troupe in its cast. (We are responsible for the scenography and costumes).

 

This is where we discovered Guillaume, a young actor and dancer, graceful, intense, and delicate. His body language, fluid, light, and almost organic, combined with a capacity to focus on the tiniest details, makes him a remarkable performer.

 

We were also fascinated by the intimate relationship he establishes almost instantly between his body and the objects or materials surrounding him, positioning himself instinctively in their midst. The verticality of a spotlight stand, a stairway edge, a wall, a piece of foam: everything seems to immediately invite his body into the most accurate placement, posture, or attitude.

 

The connections between dance and sculpture (in an extended sense) are fundamental to all our creations, and we couldn’t remain indifferent to such an astonishing sensitivity to objects!

 

This unique physical connection to the world around him is something we also experienced — in a different way — when we saw Sylvain dance for the first time many years ago. It felt like all the air around him took on a particular density and thickened. These two exceptional dancers seem to share many common traits: their sometimes very quiet reserve, or the constant intensity and renewed significance of the moments they live on stage.

 

Both were immediately captivated by our proposal for the show. Guillaume expressed great enthusiasm at the idea of performing a duet with ‘a great dancer,’ and Sylvain, who has led numerous workshops with audiences sometimes limited by age or disability, instantly sensed the choreographic and human richness of the project.

 

L’art de vivre (The Art of Living) is also the title of a painting by Magritte, which we took as inspiration to create the scenographic and artistic environment for the performance.

 

We reproduced Guillaume and Sylvain’s faces on covers that wrap around numerous inflatable spheres of various sizes. A small enclosure wall temporarily immobilizes these sphere-faces that seem eager to escape. Labile and light, they offer, through their movements, multiple and uncontrollable appearances/disappearances of the performers’ faces.

 

 

Wanting to extend the surrealist inspiration of the painting and strengthen the organic nature of the spheres, we replaced the hardness and roughness of bricks with the softness of foam and fur. Both hard and soft, these little furry walls unfold and reconfigure to reinvent the stage space.”

Yvan Clédat and Coco Petitpierre

 

Concept, scenography, costumes: Yvan Clédat and Coco Petitpierre

Choreography: Sylvain Prunenec, Yvan Clédat, and Coco Petitpierre

Cast: Guillaume Drouadaine, Sylvain Prunenec

Sound creation: Stéphane Vecchione

Lighting creation: Yan Godat

Dramaturgy: Beaudoin Woehl

Textile realization assistant: Anne Tesson

 

Production: TWENTYTWENTY

Co-productions: In progress

Administration, distribution: Clémence Huckel and Iris Cottu – Les Indépendances