This fable, more than five centuries old, could very well have been written  today, because it responds to a reality of today's culture.
The Oak and the Reed, or the confrontation between two distinct conceptions of dance, but so related.
On  one side Oak, emblem of nature by its robustness and inflexibility in  the face of the elements, and on the other side, the Reed with his flexibility,  which undergoes the elements but never yields.
I  chose this fable, because it illustrates my career as a dancer  resulting from an emerging choreographic movement, malleable, facing an  installed system, rigid.
Mourad Merzouki

Born in Lyon in 1973, Mourad Merzouki began practicing martial arts and circus arts as early as a seven-year-old. At the age of fifteen, he encountered hip-hop culture for the first time and through it, he discovered dance.

He quickly decided to develop this form of street art while also experimenting with other choreographic styles, particularly with Maryse Delente, Jean-François Duroure and Josef Nadj.

The wealth of his experiences fed his desire to direct artistic projects, blending hiphop with other disciplines. In 1989 he, along with a group of dancers, created his first company ‘Accrorap'.

In 1994 the company performed Athina during Lyon's Biennial Dance Festival; it was a triumph that brought street dance to the stage.Merzouki's travels have led him into unchartered territory, where dance can be a powerful means of communication.

In order to develop his own artistic style and sensitivity, Merzouki established his own company, Käfig, in 1996.

In January 2006, Compagnie Käfig began a period of residence at Espace Albert Camus in Bron. The theatre became the venue of the Karavel Festival, created in 2007 under the leadership of Mourad Merzouki. The festival invites some 10 different hip-hop companies and other initiatives to the city.

In parallel, Mourad Merzouki spearheaded the inception of a new center for choreographic creation and development: Pôle Pik opened its doors in Bron in 2009.

In June 2009, Mourad Merzouki was appointed director of the Centre chorégraphique National de Créteil et du Val-de-Marne. He continues to develop his projects there, with an accent on openness to the world.

In 18 years, the choreographer has created 22 shows and his company gives on average 150 performances per year around the world.

Source : CCN Créteil et Val-de-Marne’s website

More information : http://ccncreteil.com/

Born in 1977, Fabien Plasson is a video director specialized in the field of performing arts (dance , music, etc).

During his studies at the Ecole Nationale des Beaux-Arts de Lyon (joined in 1995) Fabien discovered video art. He was trained by various video artists (Joel Bartoloméo Pascal Nottoli , Eric Duyckaerts , etc) .
He first experimented with the creation of installations and cinematic objects.

From 2001 to 2011, he was in charge of Ginger & Fred video Bar’s programming at La Maison de la Danse in Lyon. He discovered the choreographic field and the importance of this medium in the dissemination, mediation and pedagogical approach to dance alongside Charles Picq, who was a brilliant video director and the director of the video department at that time.

Today, Fabien Plasson is the video director at La Maison de la Danse and in charge of the video section of Numeridanse.tv, an online international  video library, and continues his creative activities, making videos of concerts, performances and also creating video sets for live performances.

Sources: Maison de la Danse ; Fabien Plasson website

More information: fabione.fr