After the noise…
What a strange week… A comment I left under a post on social media somehow got more attention from news outlets and commentators than I anticipated. My short comment had more leg to it than the few compressed characters of a social media post — I developed this in a longer essay (here the link). Still, with the backlash getting out of proportion, reading some of the comments and watching countless reels with all sorts of takes on it, I find myself reflecting further on the cultural significance of this episode, the conversation it brought to light — old and new — and my own position on the subject.
"No one cares about this anymore" — T. Chalamet
In a long interview with Matthew McConaughey and Timothée Chalamet for Variety, Chalamet made a quick — and out of context — comment on ballet and opera. "I don't want to be working in ballet or opera or things where it's like, 'Hey! Keep this thing alive, even though no one cares about this anymore.'" While it may be a quirky uneducated comment, it points to a far more serious topic.
Ballet's Future in Europe
Europe is producing exceptional ballet dancers. It may also be quietly dismantling the conditions that make them possible.
Violence against women
After posting about what constitutes the musical environment on which the ballet rests, I would like to address what the core of the ballet/piece is about - Violence against women….
About Giselle…
This Giselle, created for the Opéra national du Rhin, begins with the same relational architecture as Adolphe Adam's 1841 ballet. A woman falls in love with someone who has deceived her. He is committed to another. The deception is revealed. Grief follows. The question of forgiveness arises…
De la définition d’un style ou se définir soi-même
Il m’a souvent été demandé de définir le style de ma chorégraphie, de mon propre langage chorégraphique.
C’est une question qui m’a toujours pris de court au début, et m’occupe encore et toujours l’esprit. De longs moments de réflexion passés à trouver une définition, une accroche - et puis me retrouver sans réponse la fois suivante.
Both in French and English