Matter

CREATION 2008
RECREATION 2014 Festival d’Avignon
60 minutes

Conception, choreography Julie Nioche
Performers (re-creation 2014) Loan Ha, Rani Nair, Julie Nioche, Filiz Sizanli
With the involvement of Bouchra Ouizguen, Mia Habib
Scenography Virginie Mira
Music Alexandre Meyer
Lighting (creation 2014) Gilles Gentner
Costumes Nino Chubinishvili et Anna Rizza
Technical management Christian Le Moulinier
Stage scenery design Les Ateliers Jipanco
With the involvement of Séverine Bessac, Laure Couturier, Sylvain Giraudeau
Videographer Laure Delamotte-Legrand
. / . More information about the team

Video and photographs available by clicking on the right tabs

Matter was created from the statements of four women who constructed their very identities through their dancing bodies.

Dressed in paper dresses representing imposed or fantasized social roles, the dancers will gradually reveal the permanent shapes of their identities as their dresses melt a way, tearing when in contact with water.

All of them wear flimsy white paper dresses which will fall apart as soon as the y are immersed in water, each dancer lea ving behind the symbols carried in this superficial skin. As they are revealed, the women fight, flee and play with their in filtrated, inherited, desired, given and imposed roles.

The dance happens, a reaction to the water and the disappearing costumes. It is a testament to sensitivity and to the resistance of the dancers as human beings.

Julie Nioche has decided to revive and revisit Matter with today’s bodies, and with other decisions and desires also brought up to date.

Press review

"The surprise and the success of Matter can be ascribed to its nature as a living plastic object.

Not only do the costumes dissolve but the floor seems to soften in a moving tableau. White at the beginning, it takes on puddles of water and then is covered with a black ink which creates strange flowers with which the white dresses become soiled. The flood transforms the stage into a skating rink/pool. All of this is directed by Julie Nioche, delivering a body of raw, instinctive, unique sensations for each of the dancers."

Rosita Boisseau, Le Monde, July 23, 2014

"This is a spectacular, well-tuned, candid, radical and honest piece,of great beauty.

[...] As the piece reveals itself, the stage is filled with a sort of black blood in which the dancers wrestle, fight and play with each other. Artistically positioned somewhere between Soulages and Malevitch, Julie Nioche offers us a nearly perfect work; the audience applauds heartily and for a long time, staying seated facing the dancers, such that the implicit message in the house is “Encore!” "

Vincent Marin, Le Dauphiné, July 22, 2014

Partners

Coproduction 2014
A.I.M.E. Association d’Individus en Mouvements Engagés. Compagnie chorégraphique conventionnée par la D.R.A.C. Ile-de-France - Ministère de la Culture et de la Communication.
L’échangeur - CDC Picardie (production déléguée)
Le Manège - Scène nationale de Reims, 
Le Bateau Feu / Scène nationale de Dunkerque, 
Espaces Pluriels - scène conventionnée danse-théâtre - Pau, 
Le Safran - scène conventionnée pluridisciplinaire et d’expérimentation - Amiens, 
Pôle Sud - scène conventionnée danse et Musique - Strasbourg.

Coproduction 2008 
La ménagerie de verre - Paris, Le Consortium, dépt. nouvelles scènes - Dijon,
Art Danse CDC Dijon Bourgogne
Les Rencontres Chorégraphiques Internationales de Seine-Saint-Denis,
Le Centre Chorégraphique National du Havre - Haute Normandie, 
Le Manège - Scène nationale de Reims,
L’ Agora de la danse - Montréal, 
Le Centre National de Danse Contemporaine d’Angers.

With the support in 2008 of CulturesFrance pour les résidences à Istanbul et Marrakech, L’Atheneum, Centre culturel de l’Université de Bourgogne Dijon (accueil en résidence), L’Institut Français d’Istanbul, L’Institut Français de Marrakech, Le ModernaDansteatern de Stockholm

Thanks Le Centre culturel français d’Oslo, l’association Catì de danse contemporaine à Istanbul, l’Université d’Istanbul, l’association Anania à Marrakech, le Festival "Entre Cours et Jardins" de Dijon, Marianne Cosserat et Irène Bony, Séverine Guerrier, Nicole Gressin, Marie-Jo Gros, Barbara Manzetti.

Tours

Premiered in april 2008 for the 20th Festival Art Danse in Dijon
May 2008 - CDN de Montreuil, salle Maria Casares, Rencontres Chorégraphiques de Seine-Saint-Denis 2008
May 2008 - CCN. du Havre, Festival Météores du C.C.N.
November 2008 - Tanzhaus de Düsseldorf, Festival with Pina Bausch
February 2009 - Le Vivat, scène conventionnée d’Armentières, festival "Vivat la Danse"
April 2009 - DeSingel à Anvers Belgique, Dedonderdagen n° 18
16th to 19th september 2009 - Montréal Quebec, L’Agora de la Danse, Destination Danse France
4th february 2010 - Le Manège, scène nationale de Reims, "Grand soir de Julie Nioche"

Further shows here