Michael is no longer there, all that remains is the sense of wonder of a dreamlike world populated by dancing phantoms, look-alikes that he has filled our imaginations with. All that remains is the sense of wonder before the planetary icon. His absence from the stage, this emptiness is illustrated here by the absence of this music overflowing with memory, especially when you wish to bring the uniqueness of the artist out from behind the clichés and fantasies. This absence in the production portrays the uniqueness of a presence, a presence that the choreographer and her team imagined, the aesthetics of a passing, a disappearance. In particular this pleasure of dance that burns in old and young alike, that creates these emotional urges that would be the symptom of the contemporary individual viewed in the multitude.

So, who would this creature be? A brilliant artist or the absolute masterpiece of show business? Our pleasure is also to enter this post-humanity that wishes to re-enchant the world, where utopias failed: to recreate, on Earth, the green paradise of our childhood loves.

Some may say that the king of pop is the symptom of ultra-liberalism which would have reduced the individual to just ‘be' instinctually. Let' leave the question open. All that remains is the pleasure of this dance that invites our icons from Nijinsky to James Brown and brings together their aesthetics in a single electric current.

An icon cannot be easily defined, mystery is her/his irradiating charm. And our pleasure!

Michel Jacques

Press quotes

Interview with Raphaëlle Delaunay on The Dancing Plague website

Updating: April 2012

A graduate of the Royal Academy of Dance in London, Raphaëlle Delaunay was admitted into the Ecole de Danse de l'Opéra de Paris, where she joined the ranks of the Corps de Ballet de l'Opéra de Paris. Upon the invitation of Pina Bausch, she joined the Tanztheater Wuppertal where she was involved in particular in interpretations of Café Muller, Le Sacre du Printemps and Kontakthof, as well as the choreography for four other pieces: Mazurka Fogo, O Dido, Wiesenland, Barbe-Bleue.

In 2000, she joined the Nederlands Dans Theater, directed by Jiri Kylian. In 2003, she met Alain Platel, with whom she worked on Mozart and Wolf, the projet dedicated to him. She also danced with the collective Peeping Tom (Belgium) in Le Jardin in 2002. As part of the company Traces, she produced Jeux d'intention (2006), Vestis (2006), Hot Dogs (2007), Ginger Jive and Bitter Sugar.

Raphaëlle Delaunay also performs for Alain Buffard, Richard Siegal and many others; she also worked with Jean-Christophe Saïs on "Histoire du Soldat". 

A commission from the Cité de la Musique enabled her to produce "Pétrouschka" in April 2012 with Radio France's Philharmonic orchestra. "Chez Joséphine" will be produced in December 2013 with the Caratini Jazz Ensemble and two dancers, as an extension of the work on danses noires (black dances). She created Chaconne (2015) at the invitation of Subsistances with the baroque ensemble of Les Nouveaux Caractères (the New haracters).

Source : Raphaëlle Delaunay's website 

More information : http://raphaelledelaunay.com/

Since 2001, the National Center for Dance (CND) has been making recordings of its shows and educational programming and has created resources from these filmed performances (interviews, danced conferences, meetings with artists, demonstrations, major lessons, symposia specialized, thematic arrangements, etc.).