MON ÉLUE NOIRE - SACRE # 2 + GULA

Annotation:

Olivier Dubois/ Germaine Acogny (FR/ SN): Mon élue noire Sacre # 2 / My Black Chosen One

The Rite of Spring, an eternal challenge that irresistibly attracts artists who want to find in it something new, to uncover a new layer. Dubois takes up the challenge together with the first lady of African dance, Germaine Acogny. It is essentially based on her life experiences and thus naturally explores the status of women, colonialism, and the strength of the human spirit regardless of age or skin colour.

The solo was created for her 70^th birthday in 2015 with the subtitle Sacre # 2, because his first and completely different version ofThe Rite of Spring was created in 2012 for the Modern Art Museum of the City of Paris. Germaine draws from personal memories of her family, which resonate with the declaration of African author Aimé Césaire: "Speech on colonialism" (1950).

There will be a short break after the first performance. 

Vincent Mantsoe (ZA): GULA

Birds are an eternal source of inspiration. They fascinate us not only with their flight, but also their distinctive body language, the consonance of their sounds with nature, their precious harmony and restlessness. All this is captured in the masterful solo GULA. "It is a distillation of an avian spirit in which rapid head turns, rippling fingers like wind-blown feathers, thigh slaps and crouching leaps remind one most of the pent up power of an eagle."

The work was created by South African Vincent Mantsoe back in 1993 and immediately led to success. The moment when the dancer is reincarnated into a bird fascinated audiences in Africa and Europe and Mantsoe later developed it into a group piece entitled GULA MATARI, for which he won awards at Rencontres Chorégraphiques Internationales de Seine-Saint-Denis and MASA 99 in Abidjan.