The body as a reservoir of worlds, - of spaces, of modes of existence, of fluxes,
of mutations, of transformations.

Opposed to the body-tool of the dancer, good boy plays around with the idea of a
body-apparatus, a favoured instrument-body by which is heightened and exacerbated
a certain form of transgression ; a body that reveals the social and moral glut,
a body that speaks vitality and sickness.

We don't know of what the body is capable. Why not start from zero with the body,
invent a new articular geography, invent another organic grammar. explore its
surface like a field of heterogeneous and independent segments, organize
relationships between masses, draw it prolongations into the space, excrescences
and growths. Transfer the original functions. Repeat everyday gestures to give it
imaginary hindrances.
Erase the identifitary contours to better sketch in others. Manufacture a useless
body to enwrap it in a new status, embrace a new stature, and shatter the
aesthetic of the sculptural ideal inherited from J.J. Winckelmann.

Alain Buffard
Paris, November 9th, 1997

translated from the original French by David Vaughn 

In 1998, Alain Buffard returned to the stage with his production Good Boy,  a choreographic self-portrait that is a bit like a blank canvas. Rather  than a solo, it’s more about the invention of solitude, its meticulous  development as a mental and physical terrain, a zone for exhibiting and  redefining oneself via the margins: merely a presence on stage, defining  the outlines of one’s being through repeated actions, positioning one’s  body as affirmation and uncertainty, a sensual and fictional field of  exploration. A solo of disintegration and reconstruction, Good Boy  creates a grammar of rebelliousness, reviewing the strategies of  invention that make it possible to rebuild a body in the face of  disease, social constraints and gender assignment. With just a few  accessories – underpants, sellotape, boxes
of medicine – which he uses  to ‘draw extensions, excrescences for himself’, he creates an aesthetic  of the minimal, of insistance and repetition. Revived by Matthieu Doze,  this ‘good boy’ continues to act – setting the resist- ance of his  physical and subjective montages against the statement that designates  him as an obedient subject.

Alain Buffard starts dancing in 1978 with Alwin Nikolaïs at the Centre national de danse contemporaine in Angers. He dances in several productions from Brigitte Farges and Daniel Larrieu, as well as Régine Chopinot, Philippe Decouflé. He realizes a choreography for two plays with Marie-Christine Georghiu, accompanied by the Rita Mitsuko rock group, a first solo "Bleu nuit" in 1988, and Wagner's Master singers of Nuremberg staged by Claude Régy in 1989.

While carrying on his career of dancer, he works as an assistant in Anne de Villepoix 's Gallery for exhibitions on R. Zaugg, Fischli & Weiss, Chris Burden and V. Acconci. At the same time, he is a correspondent for two Norwegian daily papers, for which he covers visual arts events in France. He stops dancing between 1991 and 1996. In 1996 he makes two decisive meetings : one with Yvonne Rainer on the occasion of the updating of her play Continuous Project ­ Altered Daily by the Albrecht KNUST Quatuor, and another one with Anna Haplrin, with whom he is working as the winner of the "Villa Medicis - hors les murs" prize.

In January 1998 he creates "Good boy", his second solo, and then makes in 1999 two trios INtime / EXtime and MORE et encore. "Tout va bien" is premiered in June 2010 at Festival Montpellier Danse and his last piece "Baron Samedi" is created in April 2012 at the Théâtre de Nîmes where he was an associated artist for both seasons 2010-2011 and 2011-2012.

He also realized "My lunch with Anna", a film with Anna Halprin in California with the help of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in France and le Fresnoy national studio for contemporary arts, where he was associated artist during the season 2004-2005.

Source: Alain Buffard 's website

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.).