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An evening between past and present with two of Angelin Preljocaj’s most iconic pieces as well as his recent creation. Between the stunning subtlety of Annonciation and the frenzy of Noces, the choreographer offers us a eulogy to lasciviousness with Torpeur. A breathtakingly beautiful triptych.
ANNONCIATION
"What can we learn from the concept of the Annunciation? What is this founding event of a religion supposed to open up in us?
While the catapult of antinomic symbols that is the Annunciation has been examined time and time again by painters over the last two millennia, astonishingly, despite it being so connected to the issue of the body, it has been virtually ignored by the choreographic art form. And yet, what’s at play here is, of course, fascinating.
In traditional iconography, Mary is often depicted in an enclosed garden that symbolises her virginity. A similarity emerges between her inner space and her environment.
The angel’s intrusion into this intimate world brings with it news of the metabolic upheaval of her body. This is why, although in the text the Virgin is described as serenely submitting to the event, many artists have depicted her expressing doubt, concern and even outrage. This strange simultaneity between submission and rebellion, this explosion of space and time, shows us that the biological process began the very moment the message was delivered. We are, in fact, in the act of conception.
This genesis through successive shifts obviously brings us back to the very mechanism of artistic creation, with the message passing from the virtual to the real. Couldn’t what we call conceptual art today be, rather than a finished art form, the announcement of a new art, the Annunciation of an art form yet to be born?"
Angelin Preljocaj
June 1995
TORPEUR
"Torpor is a bodily state, somewhere between stupefaction, prostration, nonchalance, dejection and abandonment, it’s a state that evokes a renunciation. A curious feeling of strangeness circulates in the most secret parts of the body, taking hold of the internal organs, tendons, muscles, blood. The skeleton itself seems to float on the verge of dislocation, creating a suspension in time and space that questions the urgency of movement, pushing it far off into an indistinct future.
This bodily state can also generate a kind of sensuality or even a languid grace. Contact and the relationship with the other thus unfolds slowly, tinged by heaviness. Heat, cause or consequence of the disorder, invades the organism; the skin seeks fresh air and the lightest touch.
So collapsing becomes an epiphany, a delicious languor.
Summoning back bodies, space and time, to give shape to indolence, to find a rhythm for slowness and perhaps invent a new idle grammar for drowsiness. That’s the challenge of this project."
Angelin Preljocaj
May 2023
NOCES
"As far as my memory goes, weddings have always seemed to me like strange tragedies:by Balkan tradition or just the fantasy of a temperamental child, I knew that the mystery would grow progressively around the bride, always absent from the festivities. The bridesmaids would change her into currency, passing from one family to another, and then she would appear at the ultimate moment, when all the spirits dim from a full day of ecstasy, staring at her, a veiled reflection of the drama which they could no longer ignore. Then offering herself in a back-to-front version of a funeral ritual, she would walk slowly, her eyes brimming with tears, towards the consented rape."
Angelin Preljocaj
February 1989
PRESS QUOTES
“An essential piece within the Ballet Preljocaj repertoire, Annonciation is a radiant, troubling and captivating work of rare aestheticism worth seeing over and over again!”
L’Oeil d’Olivier
“At the heart of the show, embraced by the now classic pieces Annonciation and Noces, the choreographer’s latest creation, Torpeur explodes with sensuality. A sublime triptych. Breathtakingly beautiful.”
Télérama
“D.H. Lawrence might have appreciated the instinctual drive and on-rush of sexual passion that dominate “Les Noces” in a powerful new updated version by the French choreographer Angelin Preljocaj (…) The five couples involved in the contemporary push-comes-to-shove duets (…) often perform in unison (which) helps generalise the emotions on view, especially the erotic drive of Mr. Preljocaj, like Lawrence, depicts as being part of blood memory.”
New York Times