SZENE
Salzburg

The title is like a manifesto. Short and evocative: fêu (in English fire) – a natural element that is both creative and destructive. For this work Fouad Boussouf looked to his Moroccan childhood for inspiration and beyond that to the ancient beginnings of our time. His ensemble, made up exclusively of women – in homage to the female-dominated environment of his early years – forms a powerful chorus. Moving in a continuous circle, the ten dancers lose themselves individually and also collectively in a physical yet earthly dance: the fi re blazes, explodes, dies down and flares up again – in a cycle without beginning or end. For Fouad Boussouf, dance is pure impulse: it is spontaneous in nature. The ingrained non-stop movement reinforces the dynamic, enabling a remarkable cyclical energy to develop. This drives forward his exploration of community on stage. We inhabit this intense collective experience at close quarters and can feel the blistering power of the women who use the circle as a range of motion to travel through space and time.
 
The French-Moroccan choreographer Fouad Boussouf graduated from the Cité Véron Academy in Paris, taught street dance and founded his company Massala in 2010. He has ignored all efforts at labelling and cultivated his own hybrid contemporary dance vocabulary that includes hip-hop elements and is often inspired by his Mediterranean roots and his interest in the visual arts. Fouad Boussouf has been Artistic Director of Le Phare – Centre chorégraphique national du Havre Normandie since 2022.

Artist talk 13. June after the performance.

 
Artistic director and choreographer: Fouad Boussouf
Dancers: Serena Bottet, Filipa Correia Lescuyer, Léa Deschaintres, Rose Edjaga, Lola Lefèvre, Fiona Pitz, Charlène Pons, Manon Prapotnich, Valentina Rigo, Justine Tourillon
Repeater: Mathilde Méritet
Music: François Caffenne
Costumes: Gwladys Duthil
Set design: Aurélie Thomas
Lights: Lucas Baccini
Master control room: Lucas Baccini
Sound master: Jean-Baptiste Cavelier
Stage master: Sarah-Lise Merkhi
Production: Le Phare, centre chorégraphique national du Havre Normandie
Coproductions: La Biennale de la danse de Lyon, Le Quartz, scène nationale de Brest, Le Volcan, scène nationale du Havre, Maison de la musique de Nanterre, scène conventionnée d’intérêt national – art et creation – pour la musique, Théâtre de Saint-Quentin-en-Yvelines, scène nationale, Equinoxe, scène nationale de Châteauroux
Residencies: Le Volcan, scène nationale du Havre

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