"OCTOPUS" from Philippe Découflé's company DCA

I saw the piece in December 2012 in the "National Theatre Chaillot" in Paris. It is situated under the hill that face the Eiffel tower,the stair that leads to the theatre show an art deco style, add with massive and strict statues that combined with the context was, as i remember quite impressive.


« Octopus » is one of the most famous piece from Philippe Découflé and his company "DCA" It has been create in 2010.
The piece is composed with eight dancers who go through eight different scenes,a full casting of characters and, Two musicians; Nosfell and Pierre Le Bourgeois  who play all the musical atmosphere,and who surround the dancers, one on each side of the stage creating a triptych.

Surrounded by the darkness, "Octopus" highlight protean human body.
Philippe Découflé question the gender the sensuality the female role as well.The piece get ride of every known style by being inspired by all of them,a mix between fashion catwalk, Indian's god, references of cabaret ,and a tribute for Béjart's bolero revisited by the musicians.

People are still entering in the room, but this guy on stage already started ,his arms are frantically dancing on a little table , on which he, all a sudden make an "hand stand" and come back to his starting point in a continuous loop,like if his arms would be some tentacles glue to the table.
Then come on stage the well known solo "duet" that show a lady wearing a costume revealing a women and a men side in the mean time, she lie on the table and as a constant in the work of Découflé , the duet is not only what we expect, but turn into a trash scene of sex, the "table guy" meet thus this "couple" which create an awkward moment, but suddenly it's a new scene. Thanks to the beautiful tricks of the musicians the rough transitions are almost excused.
Follow an other duet nothing new but smoothly interpreted ,and a women making a recitation about the "metalanguage" which seems coming out from nowhere.
All of that is made possible thanks to many support such as special effects, magnetic sensors, projection, typical tricks like a suspended rope, and an important decor.
The next scene introduce the already known couple hanging in ropes , echoing to the sexual practice of bandage which seemed for me at first a little bit of an easy trick, that is most of the time not pushed further.

But even before i made my criticism, the dancers that were moving on stage started to play also with ropes but more like a geometrical game where the sensors on the ropes help to project the movement of it on a screen describing the motion of the body in a smart and dynamic way. Not without reminding the work that Forsyth develop around the journey of the movement.

 

As he like to do it often, Découflé isolate one part of the body and highlight it, here he choose the legs, walking from the dark corner appear some pair of infinite legs, a long black deer/doe is leading the horde on heels, topped with giants hairy horns.
Such as Steve Paxton or Trisha brown ,the choreograph liketo use the simple motion like walking, and it fit perfectly in this context where making more would have been overloads in my sense.
 

As last image of the piece and after all these different windows,the dancers are gathering around a podium on which each of them in the manner of Béjart  in his Bolero, will dance filmed by a camera on the top which give a genius kaleidoscope view of the movements, having time by time their moment of glory. 

 

Finally apart from few long moments and a global structure sometimes versatile , if i would use a positive word,

"Octopus" is a real anthem for the beauty in all these different shape, revealing with respect the goddess beauty of common monster, making underground creatures radiant angels.
The music is also switching from light to darkness, always giving a push when the dance part seems to get tired. I already knew Nosfell as his own performer but he succeed as well to be a part of this show, where music is, for me, as much important as the dance.

Link to the video of the piece
And if you want to know more about Nosfell!

Eliott Marmouset 

 








 





 



 

Pina Bausch in Naples, Italy - the Tanztheater Wuppertal dances at San Carlo Opera house the legendary choreographies Café Müller and The Rite of Spring.

San Carlo Opera House, Naples, Italy

Café Müller, music by Henry Purcell

The Rite of Spring, music by Igor Stravinsky

Directed and choreographed by Pina Bausch

Sets and costumes Rolf Borzik

Sunday 14 July 2013, 17.30 GMT

Founded in 1973, the Tanztheater Wuppertal continues to present the work of Pina Bausch in the world, under the direction of her longtime collaborator Lutz Förster. On the occasion of the fortieth anniversary of its activities, the company performed at the San Carlo Opera House in Naples, on July 14th, with two very famous choreographies: Café Müller, choreographed in 1978, and The Rite of Spring, choreographed three years before.

Two masterpieces that time has consecrated by revealing the amazing timelessness, especially after the death of her creator, Pina Bausch, important figure of the dance theater of the twentieth century.

When the first silhouette, with the eyes closed, bare feet, arms abandoned along the sides, stumbles into space, we begin to recognize shapes, images, movements, of which much has been read and spoken. The importance of seeing live the Tanztheater Wuppertal in Cafè Muller is not merely the attendance to one of the most relevant dance theater pieces of the twentieth century. But it is also the possibility of tracing our own path, feeling lost, trembling for a hug.

Time did not scratch this choreography. The only thing that changed is the scene: the white wall with a door has been replaced by transparent panels. For the rest, we can still see the big room in the penumbra of "Café Müller" with lots of chairs and tables and a revolving door in the background.

And while the audience of subscribers (mostly unaware of what they are going to see) and fans (conscious of what they are expected to live), takes place, the excitement increases and thoughts fly to the video of the 1985 performance - the only chance I had to discover this choreography - and the intense interpretation of Pina Bausch. The expectations for this performance were very high but I can say I have never seen a performance full of so many mixed feelings: love and hostility, tenderness and aggression. An intensely touching choreography.

The excitement does not drop during the interval, which sees in action a fast paced and perfectly sync large group of technicians. A changing stage choreography: from the disappearance of a forest of chairs to the appearance of a land carpet.

Forty are the years of the German company and a century has elapsed since the first performance of Stravinsky at the Théâtre des Champs-Elysées in Paris. It's primitive, wild, "The Rite of Spring" by Pina Bausch, dated 1975.

I cannot imagine different movements for such notes. The choreography is fierce and ruthless, and shows contrasting solos and violent mass games in which there are sixteen men and fifteen women.

The alternation of quick movements, full of terror, in quiet moments, increases the tension. The stage is filled with sand and that's where the battle takes place between the “Chosen one” a young girl who will be sacrificed to consecrate spring and the tribal community. The ancestors surround the Chosen One, who marks the ritual with the beginning of her sacrificial dance to the death. When the dance reaches its peak (her final exhaustion), the music climaxes, by signifying that the “annual cycle of forces which are born again…is accomplished in its (the music’s) essential rhythms. The choreography in Bausch’s The Rite of Spring correlates to the music, but in a symbiotic way: the two elements seem to be furthering each other rather than the choreography simply trying to keep up with the music as the piece rolls on. Unlike other choreographic versions celebrating heroes, the one celebrated by Bausch is a woman who is desperately fighting with all her might against her fate trying to escape the sacrifice in a revolt that generates pity. Red dressed, in an exhausting dance of denial and acceptance, she will succumb with her body, but not with her soul.

Impeccable are the movements, the musicality of the dancers, the expressiveness, the soul with which they danced.

I watched the performance both incredulous and touched. I found myself confused at the end of the performance, almost shocked. The gesture that I saw is a gesture in which we ought to recognize ourselves, as a ritual to get lost in.

Cafè Muller and The Rite of the Spring must be part of the culture of all of us. They are the history that lives through dance.

  

Extract of Café Müller danced by Pina Bausch.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jm70fMM3JAk

Federica Panariello

"Darkness is absence of light"

The Black pice:
"But one is all it takes"

“The Black piece” made by Ann Van De Broek (in collaboration with WArd/waRD) takes audiences into the gloom to find that other black, filled of movement and empty at the same time. The production of Flemish choreographer makes you ask yourself if what you see is real or not? When and how do you recognize it?

The performance starts without lights: the man from your right starts to laugh hysterically, few performers are walking behind you. This cabalistic atmosphere takes you immediately into the 

darkness. This darkness pulls you into the depth of black, where the essences have double meanings: old becomes new or young; man becomes woman; silence becomes more exciting; what you see is just a hallucination.

The darkness exists by the light. The choreographer spotlights the idea of life - it begins in a black capacity. Therefore, the great amount of light was used to shine five dancers lining up in front of the audience and was there to show their impulsive and expressive movements, strong physicality, nature of the body. In an instant theirs synchronized phrase disintegrates and black returns back. Chaotic state takes over. 

The Black piece:
"The reality"

The Cameraman (Bernie van Velzen) is the person who lead the situation. Only with him you are able to see what is happening. Moreover, Ann Van De Broek plays with the spectators and show "live" filming images and unreality, as if it was a real life, where you would make your own decisions and look through your own perspective. When you are in a black “sphere”, all you senses are alert. Therefore, when the stage is not illuminated, we do hear sounds, which are always supporting the performance.However, the musical line of the spectacle do not stay only with random sounds, it is developing to the thrilled voice of Gregory Frateur, whose singing makes you feel helpless and powerful simultaneously.

There are five performers on the stage: 3 men and 2 women, who move with a lot of energy. While they are in the stage, they can easily switch theirs own characters, with somebody else: a traipsing woman in a tight skirt starts to behave as she were a man playing with black matryshka or the other dancer, 

thumbing through the notebook, would dance in convulsive way. All of them show an 

magnificent presence and excellent technique skills, which is always inspiring.

The Black piece:
"Lining up" 

Ann Van De Broek’s black can be all sorts of shapes, whether it is erotic, fearful, exciting or 

contradictory. The way she creates the whole piece felt for me really impulsive, but at the same time 

organic. This piece should been seen by everyone who is interested in dance and theatre.


If you would like to get more information about this company, choreographer or even find next performance day, there is the link, which can help you:
http://www.wardward.be/e-choreo-huidige.html


Also, there is a small trailer of "The Black piece" by Ann Van De Broek on Vimeo channel:

http://vimeo.com/97118105