Donald Trump at the heart of a committed dance show in Avignon

The new director of the Grand Avignon Opera Ballet has made the bold choice to stick to current events with “America”, a committed contemporary creation. To be discovered on November 30 and December 1, in partnership with France 3 Provence-Alpes-Côte d’Azur.

The choreographer Martin Harriague does not hide his fascination for the United States and particularly for the character of Donald Trump, whose rhetoric he has studied extensively since 2016. With the re-election of the candidate to the White House, his show “America” ​​is completely anchored in current events, while tackling a subject never before treated by dance.

Designed for the Opera Ballet, this one-hour piece features 14 dancers playing a showman “without limits which makes the race for the White House the triumph of performing art”. The choreography takes place against a backdrop of electro music, images and sound fragments taken from Trump’s speeches or events such as the assault on the Capitol… A committed work, which questions the paradoxes of American society.

I mischievously use his simplistic rhetoric and play on the paradox: the character is both entertaining and chilling. The rusticity of the messages echoes the complexity of the world, the musicality of the language coats the crudeness of the words, the speech celebrates love and brutal force, sings of pride while plunging us into a dark night.

Martin Harriague, dance director of the Opéra Grand Avignon

“America” is part of a creative continuity, taking up and completing previous creations by the choreographer, such as “Walls” (2019) for the Basque-Spanish company Dantzaz and “Americaaa” (2020) for the Leipzig Ballet.

This work will be Martin Harriague’s first meeting with the Avignon public. Appointed last September at the head of the Ballet, he defends an artistic project which gives “the priority to a physical, virtuoso, inventive dance… in touch with the issues of our time and revealing new talents”.

An orientation welcomed by the director of the Opéra Grand Avignon: “he carries a project strongly anchored on the questions of our time and on the link to the world in which we evolve” underlines Frédéric Roels. “It is extremely relevant and very in line with the vision that I myself defend for the Opera.”

Martin Harriague is not finished with the United States and will offer a new artistic adventure next spring. On May 17 and 18, he invites three of the most prominent American choreographers: Rena Butler, Mike Tyus and Stephen Shropshire.

Echoing “America”, this program called “United Dances of America” ​​will be dedicated, in a more abstract but just as impactful way, to the universal quest for freedom, authenticity, identity. Three different perspectives, but the same fervor to denounce confinement, whether physical or social, and to explore the liberating force of dance…

This new season reinforces the evolution of the Avignon ballet: for a long time serving opera performances, it is now moving towards a more contemporary and contemporary aesthetic, while maintaining an international influence. Every year, the team made up of 6 dancers and 6 permanent dancers, as well as 2 apprentice dancers, goes on tour to numerous stages in France and around the world.

The Ballet also invests in mediation actions and increases its interventions with new audiences. Far from the stage, the dancers go, for example, to meet residents, in public spaces, with short choreographies designed for the urban environment. Another way to bring dance to life…

America
November 30 at 8 p.m., December 1 at 4 p.m.
A production of the Opéra Grand Avignon.
Choreography, costumes, sets and lights: Martin Harriague.
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