Every year, in Paris, the Autumn Festival, dedicated to contemporary arts and the meeting of disciplines, offers from September to December events that welcome around 250,000 spectators. This year, on the occasion of its 48th edition, the festival celebrates the centenary of one of the greatest figures in the history of contemporary dance: the revolutionary choreographer and American visionary, Merce Cunningham. A cultural event that will be held on Saturday, November 30th until December 31st.
Great physical challenge. Ten years after the death of the choreographer, students of the Conservatoire de Paris learn to dance excerpts from his repertoire.
"The Cunningham is very square," said Leo, a conservatory student. "It looks like the classic technique, some movements are not naurels," he adds.
Laws of balance and anatomy
Through this learning, students are guided by two former dancers of the choreographer. The goal: to convey Cunningham's vision to the artists of tomorrow.
For Cédric Andrieux, director of the National Conservatory of Paris, Merce Cunningham's dance "has been so revolutionary that there are still things that, for the general public, remain unprecedented".
Indeed, on the border of the laws of balance and anatomy, the American choreographer has always sought to break conventions. In the United States, he was considered too avant-garde. Also, it is in France that it made a name, from the years 1950, producing more than 200 ballets which probe the mysteries of the life through the dance.
"I want to keep trying to learn things that I do not know yet," he said.
Saturday evening, 106 dancers of the National Conservatory of Paris will seize the large hall of La Villette to stage the brand of the choreographer: an "event", unique performance, unprecedented combination between extracts of his pieces. This time, it will be the biggest "event" in the world, a tribute to the height of the invaluable work left by Merce Cunningham.