The BnF brings its treasures into dialogue with contemporary dance

The contemporary dance continues its conquest of showrooms! After the Orangerie museum and its “Dance in the Water Lilies” cycle, it’s at the National Library of France (Richelieu site) that you will have to run this Monday, January 20 to attend the first performance of the shows “Choreography for a work”.

Eager to set its collections in motion, the institution invites choreographers to choose a work from its permanent collection or from its reserves, and to respond to it with a dance performance.

For this first, place at Mathilde Monnierformer director of the National Choreographic Center of Montpellier and the National Dance Center in Pantin, who will focus on the very famous Great Wave (1831) by Japanese Hokusai (1760–1849).

A print in motion

The print, which is part of the set of “Thirty-six Views of Mount Fuji”, will be exceptionally exhibited in the Oval room of the library, and will see no fewer than six performers active around her (Pierrick Claudel, Danaé Durand, Sarah Garnaud, Tom Guilbaud, Margot Jude, Emma Lois) on a music by Ryūichi Sakamoto and in costumes by Olivier Saillard.

These will offer a poetic activation of the wave frozen forever… Then, the performance will give way to a discussion with the curator Valérie Sueur (in charge of the collections of 19th century prints at the National Library of France).^e century), which will complete the interpretation of a historical and aesthetic analysis of the work.

Other dates to come

A nice and interesting meeting in perspective, which will be followed in the coming months by two other dates: March 31, choreographer Noé Soulier will respond in its own way to the old manuscripts in the collections; while on May 17, the Museum night will offer the public the opportunity to discover a variation of the dance cycle through the “Choreographies for a museum” project, which will not focus on a single work but on all the collections, and more particularly on the pieces of Barthélemy Toguo. Good news: entry will then be free and open to all!