As the sixth part of Dispositifs, a series of choreographic pieces in convergence with the visual arts, Velvet takes as its starting point the stage curtains - in their symbolism of veiling/unveiling and their evocative power, but also in their sensitive materiality.
In the theatrical context, the curtain is the gateway to the spectacular: something is going to happen, like a promise to the audience for which the show is the response. Does it meet our expectations, does it lead us towards an enchantment, a drama, or does it take us elsewhere by playing with our expectations?
Beyond the references mobilized by the materials (the velvets of the cabaret, the glitter of the shows and the solemn austerity of the black), it is a game on the sensations which is deployed; a setting in exergue of the "what it makes us".
This tension between narrative and sensation develops in a succession of textures and colors, a diversity of universes through which three characters interpreted by Géraldine Chollet, Yann Philipona and David Zagari, mixing profiles linked to both dance and theater.

As a basic principle of the Dispositif series, the entire work is derived from the scenography. The one at the heart of the present project offers fertile characteristics and induces certain specific lines of research:
working on a succession of curtains means questioning the very matter of the spectacular, the exhibitus (putting it in the sight of); it means linking it to the human, to the presentation of the self that governs all relationships, and to what we tell about ourselves.
It is, of course, the relationship with the audience that is called upon: first impressions and flashes of insight can be contradicted or modulated. The word curtain comes from the Old German ‘ridan’, which means ‘to twist’, and curtains are capable of twisting perception.

The balance between sense and sensation is more than ever called upon.
There is an inevitable succession of images in this Dispositif, and it is important to weave a progression, to install recurrences and links and to develop a rhythmic score. The aim is to develop a form of narration that is concerned with meaning while leaving it open.
The context made it necessary for me to work on “characters” and “figures”. The result is a cast that features a dancer who sings, a virtuoso dancer and an actor. They will cross the whole work and constitute a link, a continuity that counterbalances the succession of images generated by the scenography. I have in mind Lynch’s Red World in Twin Peaks, the cabaret curtain in Pommerat’s Je Tremble, etc.

The stage set-up allows for a series of changes at varying speeds of a dozen curtains.
The choice was made to progressively move the curtains from the back to the front, i.e. from the distance to the front of the stage. Thus the stage space is reduced and flattened, the performers are as if “pushed to the front” and overexposed, and for the audience there is a crescendo of sensations and perceptions of textures.
This order generates a form of strangeness, like a “countdown”, as if we were going back in time. It structures the dramaturgy around what hides or interrupts what we have just seen, and around what continues to exist in the background, hidden from the audience’s view.

Concept & choreography
Philippe Saire

Choreography in collaboration with the performers
Géraldine Chollet, Yann Philipona, David Zagari

Assistant
Emilie Blaser

Lights & technical direction
Vincent Scalbert

Sound design
Stéphane Vecchione

Costumes
Isa Boucharlat

Supports and partners
Cie Philippe Saire is governed by a joint support agreement between the City of Lausanne, Canton of Vaud and Pro Helvetia - Swiss Arts Council; and is supported by Loterie Romande, by the Philanthropic Foundation Famille Sandoz, by the Foundation Françoise Champoud, the Pour-cent culturel Migros, the Centre Patronal and the Fonds culturel de la Société Suisse des Auteurs (SSA). Cie Philippe Saire is in permanent residency at Théâtre Sévelin 36, Lausanne.

↳ PHOTOS HD

↳ TECHNICAL RIDER