preview
concept, choreography, performance: Maria Donata d'Urso
lighting design: Caty Olive
sound design: Vincent Epplay
scenography: Jérôme Dupraz and Maria Donata d'Urso
assistant: Élise Capdenat
technical direction: Erik Houllier
co-production: disorienta; Rencontres Chorégraphiques Internationales de Seine Saint Denis; Centre chorégraphique national du Havre; Fabbrica Europa; MC2, Grenoble
with the support of DRAC Île-de-France - Ministère de la Culture et de la Communication
with the support of La Ménagerie de Verre; Parc de La Villette; Centre National de la Danse and ARCAL for the use of space
with the collaboration of Culturesfrance, Ambasciata di Francia and Institut Français de Florence
production: lelabo
Lapsus is a preview of a production that will debut in May in Le Havre. It is a sensitive investigation of the body as the sole subject and means of representation, and of the skin as the visible location of the relationship between the body and its surrounding space. The concentration on the perceptions of the body extends the idea of threshold, of edge. The objective is to bring to life the space just above the surface of the skin, where energy circulates. Space is not only a surrounding packaging but also the transmitter for dynamic energy. The choreography plays with the void to blur absence and presence and give substance to scenic volume.
The skin, as the base level of representation, is at the heart of Pezzo 0 (2). In this first solo, the skin is the only visible surface, a membrane on which the events and signs of the body are registered. In Collection Pariculière (shown at Fabbrica Europa 2006), the relationship with a horizontal supporting surface allows a different scrutiny of the body and highlights the power of gravity as a creator of forms and events stripped of any illustrative or narrative function. The driving force of the work takes it not towards abstraction from the body, but towards a harmonisation of its perception. It works by subtraction rather than by the conscious
construction of a desired abstraction.
A third solo: Lapsus
Lapsus: running, the coursing of rivers or the motion of the planets, skidding, falling, rapid and regular movement, flight, a slide towards the unknown. The examination of bodily perceptions leads me to broaden the idea of threshold, of boundaries, of borders, and to bring to life the space just above the skin, where energies circulate and make one aware of a totality, a quality, a sensation. It is a third solo to explain the imperceptible space where perceptions slide, stretch, relax and throb. It explores the axes of the relationship between the body and the presence of surrounding space. In fact space is not simply a container but a transmitter of energy. It responds to the motion of the body and becomes itself a subject, a living texture. It attempts to endow scenic volume with a materiality, to play with the abstractions of the void, to blur absence and presence.
Creation of scenic space
I work on the idea of proximity to and distance from the spectator's point of view and on the transformation of one scenic space into another: a curved surface which allows the development of the relationship with a volume that is at once empty yet tangible and visible, where the reference points remain unstable.
Creation of a light space
The lighting design is independent yet related to the scenic structure. The lighting arrangement creates dynamics that act on the surface of the skin to emphasize the movement from one depth to another and to reveal the transition of the form to the space containing it.
Creation of a soundscape
The sound and its amplification use a range of materials and sources of vibration, which also interact with the perception of the confines of the skin. The invention of other spatio-temporal references and the interplay between total immersion and a single source, interact with the body in the creation of sonic space.
Maria Donata d'Urso
Maria Donata d'Urso. Born in Catania, she was educated at the Facoltà di Architettura and the Centro Professionale di Danza Contemporanea in Rome, where she met Steve Paxton. In 1985 she moved to New York where she worked with Richard Haisma (Nikolaïs Company) and studied with Merce Cunningham. She settled in Paris in 1988 and took part in the early works of Paco Decina (Circumvesuviana, Ombre in Rosso Antico, Fessure, Mare Rubato). In 1997 he created the solo Ombre portée for her.
She worked with Jean Gaudin (A mia Zia, Ecarlate, La Dame aux Camélias), Hubert Colas (Terre), Francesca Lattuada (Les Dieux sont Fâchés, Le Testament d'Ismail Zotos), Arnold Pasquier (Angela, Le Chemin, C'est Merveilleux) and Marco Berrettini (Un Maximum d'élan). Between 1990 and 2000 she trained in Chinese energetics. In 1994 she created La Bella Grande Libertà-Nord with Philippe Riera. In 1999 she made Pezzo O, inspired by meeting Laurent Goldring. Between 2000 and 2005, she worked with Christian Rizzo on Et pourquoi pas: Bodymakers, Falbalas, Bazaar, etc, etc... ?, Numéro 13 and Soit le puits était profond, soit ils tombaient très lentement, car ils eurent le temps de regarder tout autour. She worked with Res Publica on Enjeu 3+4x3, an interactive stage device and doTnana, an interactive solo. In June 2002 she created the solo Pezzo 0 (due) in Lisbon, staged in France and abroad and which is still in her repertoire, and Sculpture mobile n.2 in collaboration with Laurent Goldring. She then founded the organisation Disorienta to develop her own projects: Collection Particulière, was performed at the Rencontres Internationales chorégraphiques de Seine-Saint-Denis in June 2005.
