The National Arts Centre presents France's provocative Ballet Preljocaj performing Le Sacre du printemps and Helikopter
November 04, 2002 -
OTTAWA -- France's Ballet Preljocaj brings this stimulating
new double-bill to the Theatre of the National Arts Centre (NAC) on
Tuesday November 19, 2002 at 20:30. Guided by the boldly singular
vision of French-Armenian dancer-choreographer Angelin Preljocaj,
this is a resolutely contemporary and innovative company. Please be
advised : there is nudity in this production
This performance by Ballet Preljocaj is part of the
NAC's Dance Series B, which is sponsored by The New RO Cable
6.
Le Sacre du printemps (The Rite of Spring), a
strikingly new version of the 1912 tour de force, uses Igor
Stravinsky's musical masterpiece as its inspiration. Stravinsky
created a modern classic, described by fellow composer Arthur
Honegger as "an atomic bomb of new music". Choreographed by Vaslav
Nijinsky, the 1913 Paris premiere of this dance work caused one of
the greatest scandals in the history of the performing arts. An
actual riot occurred, although audiences were more outraged by the
music than by the choreography, in which a primitive tribe allows a
young girl to dance herself to death. Choreographer Angelin Preljocaj
says "...this work is just as much a matter of fascination as of a
feeling of ancestral terror. This music unceasingly carries along
with it a slowly rising force of desire and at the same time a kind
of controlled panic, a blend of madness and jubilation stimulated by
our senses. In the face of this ancestral mechanism, the bodies of
the dancers, drunk with exhaustion, have no choice but to participate
in this ritual."
"Preljocaj's Rite of Spring is not only totally
amazing, it is overwhelmingly moving. You had to have every ounce of
the choreographer's musical understanding in order to dare to take on
the subject of the musical score, against the grain."
Dominique Frétard, Le Monde, October 2001
Driven by German composer Karlheinz Stockhausen's Helikopter
Quartet, which combines helicopter engines and violins,
Helikopter is a multi-media work of majestic beauty which
juxtaposes dancers and video projections. Choreographer Angelin
Preljocaj says "[initially] the idea of creating a
choreography to this music did not cross my mind at all since this
work seemed to erode, at each turn of the helix, the actual
foundations of a relationship between music and dance. It is, in
fact, for this reason that, the second time I heard it, the
jubilatory desire to confront the intertwining helix turbines and the
glissandi of the Arditti Quartet irrepressibly emerged. The challenge
of this creation was to expose 6 dancers to the wild, techno-organic
rhythms of this piece by Stockhausen and articulate the whole around
the work of Michel Saup, the plastics arts specialist and video
director, the instigator of a veritable living wall reacting to the
dancers' movements."
"Helikopter creates a united whole: booming music
recorded in a heliport, lines and figures gliding across the floor by
the magic of video, duos tripled and cut with resolute vigour.
Preljocaj takes up the idea of the movement of the helicopter blades,
echoed in the rotations of the dancers' bodies, their arm movements
and the intertwining of the couples..."
J.C. Diénis, Danser, April 2001
Created in 1984, Ballet Preljocaj is now established at La
Cité du Livre in Aix-en-Provence. Since the founding of his
company, now composed of 22 dancers, Angelin Preljocaj has created
more than twenty works; seven are currently in the Ballet's
repertoire, ranging from duos to a score for 12 or more dancers.
Resolutely contemporary, with an emphasis on creation, the sharing of
its repertoire in France and abroad represents one of the company's
priorities. The company has toured to Australia, Japan, China, South
Korea, Germany, Italy, Belgium, Slovenia, Croatia, Russia, Czech
Republic, Hungary, Macedonia, Albania, the Netherlands, the United
Kingdom, Canada, Luxembourg, and the USA.
