Mathilde Monnier holds a reference position in the French and international contemporary dance landscape. Her creations continuously defy expectations thanks to constant renewal. Her nomination as director of the Centre Chorégraphique de Montpellier Languedoc-Roussillon in 1994 has initiated a series of collaborations with people coming from different artistic domains. From artist Beverly Semmes to philosopher Jean-Luc Nancy from film director Claire Denis, Mathilde Monnier has always pushed the boundaries of a work she sees as an experience above all. Musical creation holds an important position with very varied collaborations within the fields of popular as well as scholarly music - jazz musician Louis Sclavis, composers David Moss and Heiner Goebbels, virtuoso platinist eriKm. More recently, she has used PJ Harvey's rock music but also the pink pop settings 2008 vallée, the show she co-created with singer Philippe Katerine. It came to a glorious end in the Main Courtyard at the 2008 Avignon festival. Fascinated by the concept of unison, she created the pastoral Tempo 76 show at the Montpellier Danse 07 festival on Gyôrgy Ligeti's music. In february 2008 she was commissionned by the Berlin Philarmonic Orchestra conducted by Simon Rattle to choreograph Heiner Goebbels opera, Surrogate Cities. More than 130 amateurs went on stage to take part to an opera dealing with the city and the power struggle within. The same year, she presented the burlesque duet Gustavia in which she appeared along with spanish performance artist La Ribot at the Montpellier Danse 08 festival. In 2009, she created Pavlova 3'23'', in reference to the classical ballet The Death of The Swan. In 2010, working in close collaboration with visual artist Dominique Figarella, Mathilde Monnier created the show Soapéra, and subsequently paid homage to Merce Cunningham by way of the show Un américain à paris. In 2011, together with choreographer Loïc Touzé and writer Tanguy Viel, Mathilde Monnier created Nos images, a work focusing on film. Together with Jean-François Duroure, she restaged Pudique acide / Extasis at the Festival Montpellier Danse 11, two duos that the choreographers created in 1984 and 1985.

Source : Mathilde Monnier 

En savoir plus : www.mathildemonnier.com 

Jean-François Duroure began his dance training at the age of 14 with Dominique Bagouet and then with Odile Duboc and Josette Baiz. He enrolled in the CNDC d'Angers at the age of 16 and went on to join the Viola Farber Dance Company. He was awarded a scholarship from the Ministry of Culture to study in New York with Merce Cunningham. Along with Mathilde Monnier, he created Pudique Acide and Extasis, which propelled them into the choreography spotlight. At the age of 19, he was hired by Pina Pausch at the Tanztheater Wuppertal, where he began performing in a wide-ranging repertoire. He thus became one of the few French dancers to be instilled by both of these dance wizards.
When he was 22, he set up his own company and began delving into the many aspects of choreographic creation. He developed a personal approach to teaching based on the study of movement, its dynamics and qualities, and on the impact of stage presence, with a focus on interweaving different artistic fields, especially music. In 2001, he was appointed Head Choreographer of the choreography program at the Conservatoire Cité de la Danse et de la Musique in Strasbourg, where he advocates a breed of dance that hinges on improvisation and personal creation as the expression of inner life.

French dancer and choreographer born in Toulouse in 1960.

After training as a gymnast, Michel Kelemenis begins dancing in Marseille at the age of 17. In 1983, he performs in the Centre Chorégraphique National de Montpellier with Dominique Bagouet and choreographs his first works, among which Aventure coloniale with Angelin Preljocaj in 1984. He was awarded the Villa Médicis Hors les Murs prize in 1987, and founded Kelemenis & cie (Association Plaisir d’Offrir) in the same year. In 1991, he received the Leonardo da Vinci scholarship and Japan’s Uchida Shogakukin fund. His numerous works (more than 60, of which 40 for his company) are performed throughout the world.

In love with movement and dancers, with those exceptional moments when gesture topples a role, Michel Kelemenis structures his works around the search for a balance between abstraction and figuration.

For his personal style, which combines finesse and athletic performance, the choreographer is invited to work with the ballets of the Paris Opera, the Rhin Opera, the Opera du Nord, the Geneva Opera and the Ballet National de Marseille.

In 2000, he directed the lyric and choreographic drama, L’Atlantide, by Henri Tomasi for the Marseille Opera. He has since collaborated with the Festival d’Art Lyrique of Aix-en-Provence: in 2003, he put to movement 4 animalacrobats in Stravinsky’s Renard, directed by Klaus-Michaël Grüber and conducted by Pierre Boulez; in 2004, he assisted Luc Bondy for the chorus movements in Handel’s Hercules, conducted by William Christie.

Since 2008, he starts a reflexion about narration concept, with an approach of creation for young audience.

Through Franch Institute, he participates regularly with French cultural services abroad in Krakow, Kyoto, Johannesburg and Los Angeles, in India, Korea and China. These trips engender training projects, new productions and bilateral exchanges with foreign companies and artists employing various modes of expression.

Numerous programs are organized in higher education and professional training institutions (Coline, Ecole Nationale de Danse de Marseille, and especially with the Conservatoire National Supérieur de Musique et de Danse de Lyon).

The 10th of december 2007, after 10 years of activity at the Studio/Kelemenis, the Conseil Municipal of Marseille votes in favor of the project Centre de danse en résidence conceived and initiated by the choreographer. Intituled KLAP Maison pour la danse, Construction begins in February 2010 with a completion date planned for spring of the following year.

Source : Kelemenis&cie

More information : http://www.kelemenis.fr/fr/

Maguy Marin was born in Toulouse in 1951 and studied dance at the conservatory there before joining the Strasbourg Ballet. In 1970 she was accepted at Maurice Béjart’s school Mudra, where she stayed three years before becoming a soloist (for four seasons) with the Ballet of the 20th Century, under the direction of Maurice Béjart. A turning point would come at the end of this period seeing her shed all her previously held conceptions “allowing a multitude of creative choices, liberty and also constraints to emerge. Nothing was ever the same”. She also began questioning the body types idealized within the dance world, a subject that would become central in her work. “With Maurice Béjart the body was magnified. Youth, virtuosity, everything sparkled. And I had a problem with that. I asked myself what happened to all those other bodies, the ones that were infirm, misshapen or uncoordinated, but who managed to keep standing nonetheless.” 

Between 1980 and 1997 Maguy Marin was based at the Maison des arts in Créteil, with her company becoming an official Choreographic Centre in 1985. 

From 1998 until 2011 she directed the National Choreographic Centre in Rillieux-la-Pape. After which time the company once again became independent, setting up in Toulouse in order to continue their creative research. In 2015 the company moved again, this time to Sainte Foy-lès-Lyon, where they set up in an old carpentry factory. Their tenure there would allow them to continue to open up the immaterial space of that which is shared, something that obstinately seeks to make itself manifest while encouraging the unfolding of a new ambitious project: RAMDAM, AN ART CENTRE. It is a place of horizontal sharing, dedicated to hosting artists and audience members alike. It is also a place intent on facilitating an on-going exchange and continuous circulation between those conducting research, amateurs, students, spectators and volunteers; as well as creating bridges between different artistic practices, laboratories, places for public relations, education and reflection. 

- 1978: Grand Prix du Concours chorégraphique international de Bagnolet - 2003: Grand Prix de la danse du Syndicat de la critique for
Les applaudissements ne se mangent pas
- 2003: American Dance Festival Award 

- 2006: Special jury prize Syndicat de la critique for Umwelt
- 2008: Bessie Award for Umwelt presented at the Joyce Theater
- 2008: Grand Prix de la danse du Syndicat de la critique for Turba
- 2011: Prix Danza & Danza for “Best Contemporary Dance Piece » for Salves - 2016: Golden Lion, Venice Biennale 

More information : compagnie-maguy-marin.fr