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Self-Unfinished (1998)

CN D - Centre national de la danse 2019 - Director : Centre national de la danse, Réalisation

Choreographer(s) : Le Roy, Xavier (France)

Present in collection(s): CN D - Spectacles et performances

Video producer : Centre national de la danse

Integral video available at CND de Pantin

en fr

Self-Unfinished (1998)

CN D - Centre national de la danse 2019 - Director : Centre national de la danse, Réalisation

Choreographer(s) : Le Roy, Xavier (France)

Present in collection(s): CN D - Spectacles et performances

Video producer : Centre national de la danse

Integral video available at CND de Pantin

en fr

Self-Unfinished (1998)

"A chair, a desk, a soundtrack, that doesn't start. A dancer in a shirt  uses strong sound effects to imitate a robot. Indeed an understandable,  even conventional idea, that is until Xavier Le Roy' s (1963, France)  play turns into a gripping mental space. Head over heels, the dancer' s  body is transformed in a real time into a series of hallucinogenic  morphological aberrations, representing images of body that reconfigures  itself based to unwritten laws and a disquieting, inhuman rhythm. It  undergoes long stases, makes infinite movements and begins to crawl  abruptly. In addition to the torsion carried out in the "spectacle de  danse" (dance performance), Xavier Le Roy taps into a new field where  scientific and social data is transferred and imprinted in imaginary  representations of the body."
Francois Piron in the journal des arts of Connivence, 6th Biennale de Lyon

The  brightly lit performing area gives no clues to "how to read" and the  mechanical - man beginning is offset with a return to ordinary task -  like activity: walk, sit, turn off tape machine. By the time you're into  the contortions with the dress, we're given this extraordinary hybrid  creature which confronts us with a multiplicity of interpretations. For  me it alternated variously as insect, martian, chicken, watering can,  caterpillar into pupa, et al. What saved it from being a Pilobolus -  like entertainment (a crowd - pleasing American group that combines  bodies to create biomorphic oddities) were the stillnesses and extended  durations. We must sit with our attention riveted, waiting for the next  stirring. Like watching a spider or snail. Your timing in this piece is  exquisite: no pandering to short attention spans here.
Yvonne Rainer (email 22.12.1999)

Source: website of Xavier Le Roy

Le Roy, Xavier

Xavier Le Roy holds a doctorate in molecular biology from the  University of Montpellier, France, and has worked as artist since 1991.  Since 2018 works as Professor at the Institute for Applied Theater  Studies in Giessen (Germany). He has performed with diverse companies  and choreographers. From 1996 to 2003, he was artist-in-residence at the  Podewil in Berlin. In 2007-2008 he was “Associated Artist”at Centre  Chorégraphique National de Montpellier, France. In 2010 Le Roy is an  Artist in Residence fellow at the MIT Program in Art Culture and  Technology (Cambridge, MA). In 2012, he begins a 3 years residency at  Théâtre de la Cité Internationale, Paris. Through his solo works such as  « Self Unfinished (1998) » and « Product of Circumstances (1999) », he  has opened new perspectives in the field of choreography.

At the same time, he initiated projects exploring the modes of  production and collaboration in group works: "E.X.T.E.N.S.I.O.N.S."  (1999-2000), "Project" (2003) and "6 Months 1 Location" (2008).
His  works such as the soli "Le Sacre du Printemps" (2007), "Untitled"  (2014), the group piece "low pieces" (2011), and works for exhibition  spaces such as "production" (2011) created together with Mårten  Spångberg, "Untitled" (2012) for the exhibition 12 Rooms,  "Retrospective" first realized in 2012 at the Tapiès  Foundation-Barcelona, "Temporary Title, 2015" created at Sydney in the  frame of John Kaldor Public Art Project or "For The Unfaithful Replica"  (2016) in collaboration with Scarlet Yu at CA2M Madrid; produce  situations that explore the relationships between spectactors / visitors  / performers and the production of subjectivities.

His works produce situations that question, the relationships between  spectators/visitors and performers and are attempt to transform or  reconfigure dichotomies such as: object / subject, animal / human,  machine / human, nature / culture, public / private, form / unform.

In 2017, together with Ensemble Issho Ni they create for the Ensemble  Modern in Frankfurt: the exhibition "Haben Sie "Modern" gesagt?", and  he developped, together with Scarlet Yu, "Still Untitled", a work for  public spaces commissioned by Skulptur Projekte Münster 2017.


Source: Xavier Leroy website


More information: www.xavierleroy.com/

Centre national de la danse, Réalisation

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.).

Self-Unfinished (1998)

Artistic direction / Conception : Xavier Le Roy

Artistic direction assistance / Conception : D’après la collaboration avec Laurent Goldring

Interpretation : Xavier Le Roy

Additionnal music : Diana Ross

Production / Coproduction of the choreographic work : Production in situ productions et Le Kwatt Coproduction Substanz-Cottbus, TIF Staatsschauspiel Dresden, Fonds Darstellende Künste e.v. aus Mitteln des Bundesministeriums des Innern. Avec le soutien de TanzWerkstatt-Berlin, Podewil-Berlin et Berlin Senatsverwaltung für Wissenschaft, Forschung und Kultur.

Production / Coproduction of the video work : Enregistré au CND le 20 mars 2019

Duration : 56 minutes

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