Artists in residence

INTERVIEW

What are the advantages of a residency at the Cité internationale des arts as a dancer?

As an artist, it is essential to take time for introspection, reflection and recuperation in a world where everything moves too fast and where we are subjected to a frantic race to produce and perform. The Cité internationale des arts offers this environment where we can let these small seeds of creativity germinate without the pressure of “doing”, but more in a perspective of “being” and “feeling”. The studios are spacious enough to be able to work at any time, in dance it is always complicated to have the right space. There is also the advantage of being able to meet artists from other cultures, other disciplines, other ideals and thus to be able to bring together universes that sometimes confront each other, but very often reinforce each other. There is a kind of consensus on the different themes that we tackle and on which I work.

As art workers, we are vectors and antennas of what happens around us, and to see that we are not alone is very good and stimulates all the more the inspiration and the determination we can have. Beyond art, there is the human encounter, whether it is with the public, other residents, Cité’s team, or other possible encounters outside the residency, which carries us and our practice on a gentle wave, at least for this precious time of suspension. Paris is a teeming city, ethnically and culturally rich, if we are careful not to be overwhelmed by the wave of information, it is possible to get the best out of it and use all this new knowledge in the service of our art.

What projects are you working on during your residency?

Originally, I was going to work on a new solo called SOLILOQUY. Finally, the pandemic led me to create it last year and to start shooting it this year. So, I dedicated some time to rework and readapt this piece for upcoming dates. In addition to that, I have been working on three main areas. First, on a more technical and physical approach: the development of my teaching methodology and my creative process. This allows me to identify the different kinesthetic stages of the dance vocabulary I have been working on for the past five years, a sort of fusion of all the dances I have experienced during my career, in addition to elements of singing and theater. One day perhaps, I will work on other mediums via collaborations: video, plastic arts, etc. Then, I conducted research on different choreographic projects, a short film and two new shows, which I will work on when I return to Montreal.

Finally, I took a more intellectual approach by wanting to understand how my artistic process fits into our society, by making it dialogue with other fields such as ecology, politics, philosophy, decolonization issues, sociology and anthropology. In short, to see things in a systemic way and to be able to make an informed decision: Why am I doing this? Does it reinforce the mortifying system that I condemn or does it contribute to the advent of other imaginaries? What radicality of discourse should I find in the face of the crumbling, now visible, of our world? What path should I trace as an emerging artist? It is very possible that I will never find the answers, but trying to face them gives my practice a kind of unity.

What are the benefits of the residency program developed by POEMART New Caledonia and the Cité internationale des arts? What led you to apply?

I have two local artist friends, Linda Kurtovitch and Sacha Terrat, who have already benefited from this partnership. They strongly recommended that I apply. POEMART, which I thank again for its confidence, provided me with financial support for the rental of rehearsal studios and accommodation costs, as well as putting me in contact with the Cité.

I might never have begun the process of obtaining a residency at the Cité, as it seems so large and almost out of reach given my brief experience in the profession. This program has given me access to this opportunity and has matured me tremendously in the space of two months. I sincerely hope that other artists will be able to come and shape their experience here while being enriched humanly, intellectually, culturally and spiritually

Let’s not forget that it is mainly thanks to culture that a country shines and shows its strength. Leaving aside a desire for domination and superiority, it seems to me that a country is always proud of its artists when they succeed, and this sometimes without its initial support.

This inter-institutional collaboration allowed me to obtain financial support from the LOGIQ Foundation and the Canada Council for the Arts, one confidence leads to another. A big thank you, it is an immense privilege to be at the Cité internationale des arts. It is through art that we will resist and it is through art that we exist.

BIOGRAPHY

Born in Kanaky, New Caledonia and Vietnamese by birth, Charles Brecard trained at the École de danse contemporaine de Montréal and now lives in Montreal (Tio’tia:ke/Mooniyang). He collaborates with many companies, institutions and artists of various disciplines.

His curiosity led him to develop FLUIDIFY, a practice influenced by urban, traditional and contemporary dances and by his profession as a sports massage therapist. He has shared it in festivals, as cultural mediation or in the framework of educational courses. His choreographies, imbued with great physicality, poetry and activism, lead him to perform locally and internationally via commissions or independent projects.

His solo SOLILOQUY received the Best Performance Award in 2021. He is the co-initiator of the “Bercail”, a nomadic place of practice, sharing and research.

His residency at the Cité internationale des arts, supported by the POEMART of New Caledonia and the Canada Council for the Arts, aims to develop his artistic approach.

A passionate researcher, he aims to approach his practice in a systemic way by establishing links between fields as varied as theater, sociology, philosophy, geopolitics and ecology, in order to understand how to fit into a crumbling system as an emerging artist. He wishes to incite a political, poetic and spiritual revolution of bodies and minds.

Paul Bréchignac (1992) was born in Paris, raised in Buenos Aires and trained in Switzerland; he graduated from the Accademia di Architettura di Mendrisio and practices independently since 2021 

Faced with the impossibility of thinking the future, his practice adopts uncertainty as a method, coexistence as a mean and resilience as a target. Its scope is building, with a particular focus on the production of spaces for culture.
Paul Bréchignac also takes part in the c/o bardi research group based in Florence.

In the context of the residence at the Cité des Arts with the Académie d’Architecture, Paul Bréchignac will conduct research on memory as a neurological process of production and aggregation of knowledge. Starting from the examination of the technique of loci, these palaces of the mind where one stores ideas, the ambition of the project is to initiate a theoretical enquiry and put together a personal ontology, through the collection and the production of a series of objects.