Love Sonnets

THIERRY DE MEY

film / 1993 / 23'

Belgian choreographer Michèle Anne De Mey  (Brussels, 1959) attended Mudra, the Brussels-based school founded by  Maurice Béjart from 1976 to 1979. She choreographed her first show, Passé Simple, in 1981, giving contemporary dance a new direction she subsequently followed with the two-handers Ballatum (1984) and Face à Face (1986).

In 1983, she became one of the four founding members of the Rosas  company. She spent six years working on devising and staging several  works by Anne Teresa De Keersmaeker, including Fase (1982), Rosas danst Rosas (1983), Elena’s Aria (1984) and Ottone, Ottone  (1988). Although Michèle Anne De Mey focuses on the connection between  dance and music, the choreography of her productions always has a strong drama content and places the dancer in a specific and innovative  relationship between stage and audience.

In 1990, while staging Sinfonia Eroica, she set up her own  company, Astragale.  There followed thirty or so productions that  enjoyed international success. Among them were Châteaux en Espagne (1991), Pulcinella (1994), Love Sonnets (1994), Cahier (1995), Katamenia (1997), Utopie (2001), Raining Dogs (2002) and 12 Easy Waltzes  (2004). Michèle Anne De Mey has also done important teaching work (in  Amsterdam, at INSAS in Brussels, at CNDC in Angers and at the École en  Couleurs, also in Brussels).

Her work as a choreographer has led to several films being made, including Love Sonnets and 21 Études à Danser by Thierry De Mey, and Face à Face  by Eric Pauwels. Devising her choreography from powerful music by  reputable composers, she has also worked with Robert Wyatt and Jonathan  Harvey. For many years now she has been forging close work partnerships  with other artists, like visual artist and scenographer Simon Siegmann,  Transquinquennal group member Stéphane Olivier and Grégory Grosjean with  whom she staged the two-hander 12 Easy Waltzes. In 2006, she revived Sinfonia Eroica, one of her landmark shows from the 1990s, a successful, irreverent and cheerful spectacle to the soundtrack of Beethoven’s Eroica  Symphony. This production has been staged more than a hundred times all  over the world since then. In 2007, she staged P.L.U.G., which deals  with the mechanics of mating and, in 2009, the one-person show Koma at  the Made in Korea festival started by BOZAR. This one-person show is  one of a series of four, with the other three being by Sidi Larbi  Cherkaoui, Arco Renz and Thomas Hauert. In 2009, she also devised Neige, using Beethoven’s Symphony No. 7, an atmospheric sequel to Sinfonia Eroica. On the occasion of the VIA 2011 festival, she staged the première of Kiss & Cry,  alongside Jaco Van Dormael and in a team with Grégory Grosjean, Thomas  Gunzig, Julien Lambert, Nicolas Olivier and Sylvie Olivé. In May 2012,  she presented Lamento, a one-person show devised for and performed by dancer Gabriella Iacono, inspired by Monteverdi’s Lamento d’Arianna.

Kiss & Cry was a great success,  playing 300 performances in 9 different languages in twenty or so  countries, and was seen by over 180,000 audience members. After this,  Michèle Anne De Mey and her team of talented designers devised Cold Blood within the context of Mons as European Capital of Culture in 2015, and this show has enjoyed the same worldwide success as Kiss & Cry.

Subsequently, Michèle Anne De Mey stepped down as director of  Charleroi Danses and restarted her company, Astragales. In Octobre 2016,  at the Théâtre National, she devised Amor, a poetical, powerful show in which, alone on the stage, Michèle Anne conveyed her own, intimate near-death experiences.

In 2019, at Liège opera, she choreographed ballet extracts for a new version of Verdi’s Aida, directed by Stefano Mazzonis. She was assisted by Fatou Traoré and worked with dancers and circus performers.

In November 2019, the choreographer will present her new work at the Théâtre des Martyrs, ‘River’, a fictional dance. This will be followed by the creation of the choreography for the opera Somnambula at the Opéra Royal de Wallonie in collaboration with Jaco Van Dormael, who will be directing. The premiere was due to take place in March 2020, but was postponed because of the lockdown.

Failing to present her creations, and feeling the urge to push further the search for an encounter between fiction and dance, she shot her first short film in 2021 in collaboration with the young cinematographer Gaspard Pauwels. ‘Fiction dansée’ stars Violette Wanty and Aurélien Oudot, both dancers and acrobats. The film is inspired by confinement and huis-clos. It tells the story of a brother and sister locked in their family home.

In 2022, she presented her show Sinfonia Eroica at the Opéra Royal de Wallonie-Liège. Successful since its creation in 1990, this show has become a classic of contemporary dance. A real call to dance, it takes on a new dimension, accompanied by the Orchestre de l'Opéra Royal de Wallonie-Liège, conducted by Ayrton Desimpelaere.

Dusseldorf's Ballet Am Rhein has invited her to choreograph one of the four temperaments in the show created by George Balanchine. She will explore the phlegmatic temperament alongside other renowned choreographers, Hélène Blackburn, John Numeier and Demis Volpi, who will focus on anger, melancholy and sanguinity respectively. The premiere will take place in June 2022.

Source and more information: https://www.astragales.be/en/

Thierry De Mey, born in 1956, is a composer and filmmaker. An instinctive feel for movement guides his entire work, allowing him to tackle and integrate a variety of disciplines. The premise behind his musical and filmic writing is the desire for rhythm to be experienced in the body or bodies, revealing the musical meaning for the author, performer and audience. He has developed a system of musical writing for movement used in pieces where the visual and choreographic aspects are just as important as the gesture producing the sound, such as in "Musique de tables" (1987), "Silence must be!" (2002) and "Light Music", which premiered at Lyon's Musiques en Scène biennial festival in 2004.

A large part of his music production is intended for dance and cinema. He has often been more than a composer for the choreographers Anne Teresa De Keersmaeker, Wim Vandekeybus and his sister Michèle Anne De Mey, offering his precious collaboration in the invention of "formal strategies" – to use a favourite expression of his. Among his main work let us mention "Rosas danst Rosas", "Amor constante", "April me", "Kinok" (choreographies by A. T. De Keersmaeker), "What the body does not remember", "Les porteuses de mauvaises nouvelles", "Le poids de la main" (choreographies by W. Vandekeybus), "Dantons Töd" (dir. Bob Wilson), "Musique de table", "Frisking" pour percussions, un quatuor à cordes, "Counter Phrases", etc.

He participated in the foundation of Maximalist! and the Ictus ensemble which created several of his pieces (dir. G E Octors). His music has been performed by major ensembles such as the Arditti Quartet, the Hilliard Ensemble, London Sinfonietta, Ensemble Modern, Muzikfabrik and the Orchestre Symphonique de Lille. Thierry De Mey's installations, in which music, dance, video and interactive processes work together, have been presented in events such as the Venice and Lyon biennials as well as in many museums. His work has received national and international awards (Bessie Awards, Eve du Spectacle, Forum des compositeurs de l'Unesco, FIPA, etc). The film/installation "Deep in the wood" (2002-2004) involved more than 70 dancers/choreographers. For the film "Counter Phrases" (2003-2004), nine composers answered his dance/film invitation : S. Reich, F. Romitelli, M. Lindberg, T. Hosokawa, G. Aperghis, J. Harvey, L. Francesconi, R. De Raaf and S. Van Eycken. In 2003, the working process with ATDK for "April me" was the subject of a documentary entitled "Corps accord", produced by ARTE which has also broadcast and co-produced most of his films.

Since July 2005, Thierry De Mey is artistic director of Charleroi/Danses along with Pierre Droulers, Michele Anne De Mey and Vincent Thirion.

In 2006, he realised an installation adapted from Perrault's tale, "Barbe Bleue" (Bluebeard), plus a film, "One Flat Thing, reproduced" based on the choreography by William Forsythe and broadcast by Arte in October. In 2007 he made From Inside for the Charleroi/Danses Biennale, an interactive installation in the form of a triptych. For the 2009 Charleroi/Danses Biennale, he created "Equi Voci", a polyptych of dance films accompanied by orchestral music and which includes "Prélude à la mer", a film based on one of Anne Teresa De Keersmaeker's most beautiful choreographies which he shot by the Aral Sea in October 2009. His latest film – "La Valse", choreographed by Thomas Hauert and the ZOO dance company – completes and close this project.

Source : Charleroi/danses

More information : www.charleroi-danses.be