Choreography : Josef Nadj

I am afraid that you will make an exception for me
Lord I beseech you do not save me
that would be more manly
do not save me
in spite of my prayers
a schoolchild repenting a first mortal sin
I shall implore you unceasingly
do not save me
with my tears I shall fill
all your receptacles
your dented thimbles
your enormous barrels
I shall sob
in all your holed black socks
Lord I beg you do not save me
let the rat
diligent worker driller of tunnels
build a road through my belly
let the wolf
locked within me
noisily chew my face
rather marvel to see us
more than ever you marveled
at seeing smitten lovers
Lord I beseech you do not save me
hear my prayer pure ice broken up
do not save me
I know you have never saved anyone
but I am afraid that you will make an exception for me
I beseech you Lord do not save me I beseech you do not save me.

                                                       Otto Tolnai
                                                       Excerpt from or brulant
Collection of poems translated from Hungarian by
L. Gaspard, S Clair and J. Lackfi
Foreword by Josef Nadj
Published by Editions Ibolya Virag, 2001

The journal of an unknown

It took Josef Nadj fifteen years to turn to the form of the solo, and without a doubt it is because it is his first experience in the matter that Journal d’un inconnu is his most introspective piece, the most clearly
autobiographical.

Renewing a connection with his first works, it once again evokes his home town Kanjiza – the piece is explicitly composed “after” both the choreographer's journal and poems by Otto Tolnai, himself also originally from Kanjiza. Nevertheless, by way of their respective creative work, Journal d’un inconnu above all pays tribute to three of the town's personalities. First the mythical Laszlo Toth, the Australian
geologist originally from Kanjiza who became world famous in 1972 – for mutilating Michelangelo’s Pieta in Rome. And next, two men Nadj rubbed shoulders with and who each committed suicide, the vagabond painter Tihamér Dobó, and Antal, also known as Toni Kovács, former wrestler become sculpture.

Manifestly a reference to Nadj himself, the title's “inconnu” – the stranger – is of course a sign of that irreducible part of strangeness to oneself that is our common lot. But it designates even more the territory surveyed, each in his own way, by the iconoclast and the two visual artists – as well as by Josef Nadj and his poet friend Ottó Tolnai. Art and creation constitute, with their part of unfinishedness and fragility, and with the place they take or should take in our lives, the central question of Journal d’un inconnu.

                                                      Myriam Bloedé 

CREDITS

Chorégraphie et interprétation : Josef Nadj
D’après le journal de Josef Nadj et des poèmes d’Otto Tolnai.
Musiques : Percussions d’Ethiopie, “Akira Sakata”, musiques traditionnelles de Hongrie, de Roumanie et
du Mexique.
Scénographie : Josef Nadj et Rémi Nicolas
Création lumières : Rémi Nicolas assisté de Xavier Lazarini
Costumes : Bjanka Ursulov
Décors : Michel Tardif
Peinture des décors : Jacqueline Bosson
Conception vidéo : Thierry Thibaudeau

Equipe technique en tournée
Régie générale et plateau : Alexandre De Monte
Régie lumières : Christian Halkin
Régie vidéo et son : Thierry Thibaudeau ou Gilles Rodriguez

Production et diffusion : Michel Chilavo

Durée : 1heure

Création à la Biennale de Venise, le 6 juin 2002

Coproduction : Centre Chorégraphique National d’Orléans, Théâtre de la Ville – Paris, La Biennale de
Venise

Josef Nadj was born in 1957 in Kanjiza, a province of Vojvodina in the former Yugoslavia, in what is today Serbia. Beginning in childhood, he drew, practiced wrestling, accordeon, soccer and chess, intending a career in painting. Between the ages of 15 and 18, he studied at the fine arts high school of Novi Sad (the capital of Vojvodina), followed by 15 months of military service in Bosnia-Herzegovina.

Afterwards, he left to study art history and music at the Academy of Fine Arts and at the University of Budapest, where he also began studying physical expression and acting.

In 1980, he left for Paris to continue his training with Marcel Marceau, Etienne Ducroux. Simultaneously he discovered modern dance, at the time in a period of swift expansion in France. He followed the teachings of Larri Leong (who combined dance, kimomichi and aidido) and Yves Cassati, also taking classes in tai-chi, butoh and contact improvisation (with Mark Tompkins), began himself to teach the movement arts in 1983 (in France and Hungary), and participated as a performer in works by Sidonie Rochon (Papier froissé, 1984), Mark Tompkins (Trahison Men, 1985), Catherine Diverrès (l’Arbitre des élégances, 1988) and François Verret (Illusion comique and La, commissioned by the GRCOP, 1986).

In 1986 he founded his company, Théâtre JEL – “jel” meaning “sign” in Hungarian – and created his first work, Canard Pékinois, presented in 1987 at the Théâtre de la Bastille and remounted the following year at the Théâtre de la Ville in Paris.

Up to now, he is the author of about thirty performances.

In 1982, Josef Nadj completely abandoned drawing and painting to dedicate himself fully to dance, and would not begin showing his work again until fifteen years later. But in 1989 he began practicing photography, pursuing it without interruption to the present. Since 1996, his visual arts and graphic works, most often conceived in cycles or series – sculpture-installations, drawings, photos – have been regularly exhibited in galleries and theatres.

In 2006, Josef Nadj was Associated Artist for the 60th Festival of Avignon, presenting Asobu as the festival's opening performance in the Court of Honour of the Palais des Papes, as well as Paso doble, a performance created in collaboration with the painter Miquel Barcelo at the Celestins Church. In July 2010, he returned to present Les Corbeaux, a duet with Akosh zelevényi.

To mark the 150th anniversary of the birth of Anton Chekhov, Valery Shadrin, director of the Chekhov International Theatre Festival and Artistic Director of the Year 2010 France-Russia, invited Josef Nadj for the creation of a show dedicated to the playwright, which was performed in Moscow and St. Petersburg.

Josef Nadj was present at the Prague Quadrennial of 16 to 26 June 2011. TheQuadrennial held in Prague since 1967, is the most famous event in the world for performing arts. More than sixty countries attended this year. Josef Nadj was selected to participate in the project "Intersection" based on intimacy and performance. An ephemeral village was created, which consisted of boxes (“white cubes / black boxes") that stood for thirty world-renowned artists, each one represented by a different box. Since 1995, Josef Nadj has been the director of the Centre Chorégraphique National d’Orléans.

Source : Josef Nadj

En savoir plus : http://josefnadj.com/