Mathilde Monnier (F) Biografie
tempo 76
Tickets
78% dance
2% grassland
20% music


It is still highly popular among cheerleaders at least. And in classical ballet. In operetta, carnival, parades, musical revues … while in contemporary dance the choreographic unison, synchronised motion, is a rather taboo form. It has, to put it carefully, fallen out of fashion, under general suspicion of being mere dressage. And yet in other spheres, it never died out – above all when it is about spectacular finales: In classical dance as in musical, the corps de ballet still often has the task of providing the pretty, clone-like backdrop that highlights the stars.
In “tempo 76”, Mathilde Monnier, one of Europe’s great choreographers, explores the possibilities of unison from a standpoint that is both critical and jubilatory, not only conceiving it as a form of movement but also examining the question as to its harmony with the environment: Space becomes in unison with the gestures. What is the connection between the subject and his environment? Or is this connection an illusion?
The idea is to reinterpret a supposedly outmoded aesthetic form, to pull it out of its original context, and lend it new meanings. And, at the same time, to treat it in a light-hearted manner – while Ligeti’s music floats with unusually light steps over the green-grass stage with its mock naturalism. An artificial staging of controlled nature. For are we not clumsily out of tune with the world’s unison? Do we not try to clutch at the rhythm of a world that we have long since been unable to hold down? And so we try to adapt ourselves to an increasingly hostile and fast environment, its meaning ever harder to grasp and discern… The question of unison is, at least for Mathilde Monnier, by no means purely formal.


Co-produced by steirischer herbst, Festival Montpellier Danse 07, Théâtre de la Ville Paris, Festival d’Automne Paris, Culturgest Lissabon, La Halle Aux Grains - Scène Nationale de Blois & Centre Chorégraphique de Montpellier Languedoc-Roussillon
Guest performance at the Schauspielhaus Graz


Fri 28/09& Sat 29/09, 7.30 pm

60’
Talk following the second performance


Schauspielhaus Graz
Choreography
Mathilde Monnier

Scenography
Annie Tolleter

Music
György Ligeti

Light design
Éric Wurtz

Costume design
Dominique Fabrègue

Artistic advice / assistence
Herman Diephuis, Laurence Alquier

Score writing
Enora Rivière

With
Yoann Demichelis, Herman Diephuis, Julien Gallée-Ferré, Jung-ae Kim, Natacha Kouznetsova, Maud Le Pladec, I-Fang Lin, Éric Martin & Rachid Sayet

Mathilde Monnier