Bouchra Ouizguen's CORBEAUX to Make New York Debut as Part of 2017 Crossing the Line Festival

As part of the 2017 edition of its celebrated Crossing the Line Festival, the French Institute Alliance Française (FIAF), New York's premiere French cultural center, joins forces with the Brooklyn Museum, Abrons Arts Center, and Movement Research to co-present The New York Premiere of Moroccan choreographer Bouchra Ouizguen's site-specific Corbeaux (Crows), Saturday, September 30, and Sunday, October 1, in the Beaux-Arts Court of the Brooklyn Museum. The engagement is supported by the Hermès Foundation's New Settings program.

Choreographed and directed by Ouizguen, Corbeaux (Crows) is a hypnotic, site-specific living sculpture. Written and created in a rigorous reappraisal of the roots of Moroccan performative ritual, the piece is a new and radical approach to contemporary dance and performance, transcending and turning the specificities and limits of any particular national and cultural tradition on its head. A company of women from Morocco and New York-including trained and untrained dancers, wearing black dresses and white headscarves-silently fans out across the space before erupting into an immersive chorus of piercing and rhythmic sounds.

Audience members are forced to position themselves around the performers, making them active participants. According to Ouizguen, "The closer they are to the dancers, the more they see the variety of the physical intentions. These movements, vocal variations, and gestures reveal themselves to be infinitely varied and different."

Ouizguen intended to present Corbeaux (Crows) only once, at the 2014 Marrakech Biennale, in the streets of the city. She has since staged the work in public spaces in cities across Europe.

Bouchra Ouizguen lives and works in Marrakech. A self-taught performer with a background in traditional dance, she founded her own company, Compagnie O, in 2010. Her interest in societal issues and the visual and popular arts in her country inform her body of work, which encompasses sound, performance, and video. In 2010 Ouizguen received the New Choreographic Talent award from France's Society of Dramatic Authors and Composers (SACD) and the Jury's special award from the professional trade union of theatre, music and dance critics, for her Madame Plaza. She presented Madame Plaza and HA! at the Crossing the Line Festival in 2010 and 2013, respectively.

IF YOU GO:

NYC Premiere : Bouchra Ouizguen: Corbeaux (Crows)
When: Saturday, September 30 at 12pm & 4pm; Sunday, October 1 at 3pm
Where: Brooklyn Museum, 3rd Floor, Beaux-Arts Court, 200 Eastern Parkway, corner of Eastern Parkway and Washington Avenue, Brooklyn
Admission: Free with Museum admission (suggested donation)
Tickets: crossingtheline.org | 800 982 2787
Information: crossingtheline.org | 212 355 6160
Transportation: Subway: 2, 3 to Eastern Parkway

Corbeaux (Crows) is a production of Compagnie O, co-produced by Service de Coopération et d'Action Culturelle de l'Ambassade de France in Rabat, with the support of the French Institute in Marrakech. This presentation is supported by the French Institute in Paris and the Cultural Services of the French Embassy in the United States. Supported by FUSED: French-US Exchange in Dance, a program of the New England Foundation for the Arts' National Dance Project, the Cultural Services of the French Embassy in the United States, and FACE Foundation, with lead funding from the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation, the Florence Gould Foundation, and the French Ministry of Culture and Communication.

Bouchra Ouizguen was born in 1980 in Ouarzazate, Morocco. She currently lives and works in Marrakech, where she has been committed to developing the local dance scene since 1998. A self-taught dancer who has performed since the age of 16, she created early experimental pieces such as Ana Ounta and Mort et Moi, which were inspired by her interests in cinema, literature, and music. Passionate about promoting contemporary dance in her home country, she founded ANANIA, a contemporary dance company, in Marrakech in 2002 before founding her own company, Compagnie O, and creating the liberating Madame Plaza in 2010, where she shares the stage with three artists from the Aïta cabaret tradition of singing and dancing.

In 2012 she created HA! for the Festival Montpelier Danse, and took the work to the Centre Georges Pompidou in Paris in 2013. This piece inspired the performance Corbeaux presented for the first time at the Marrakech Biennal in 2014. In 2015 she performed Ottof at the Festival Montpelier Dance and the Festival d'Automne in Paris. In 2017, she created Jerada for the dancers of Carte Blanche, the Norwegian National Contemporary Dance Company.

Crossing the Line Festival is an international arts festival for New York City produced by the French Institute Alliance Française (FIAF) in partnership with leading cultural institutions. The festivalis co-curated by Lili Chopra, FIAF's Executive Vice President and Artistic Director; Simon Dove, Executive and Artistic Director of Dancing in the Streets; and Gideon Lester, Artistic Director for Theater and Dance at the Richard B. Fisher Center for the Performing Arts at Bard College.

France has a long history of supporting national and international cultural practices, welcoming and nurturing new ideas and influential perspectives from around the world. FIAF, as the leading French cultural institution in the US, critically maintains that practice through the Crossing the Line Festival, presenting leading-edge artists from France and the US alongside their peers from around the world.

Since its inauguration in 2007, Crossing the Line Festival has cultivated an increasingly large and diverse following, and received numerous accolades in the press including "Best of" in The New York Times, Wall Street Journal, The New Yorker, Time Out New York, Artforum, and Frieze. Festival performances have earned multiple Obie and Bessie awards. Go to crossingtheline.org.

Crossing the Line is thrilled to partner with the Hermès Foundation (Fondation d'entreprise Hermès)'s New Settings Program for a fifth consecutive year. Launched in 2011, New Settings supports new performing arts productions that shift borders between disciplines to create innovative art forms. This year, works by Bouchra Ouizguen, Annie Dorsen, and Alessandro Sciarroni are presented within the framework of Crossing the Line. Visit www.fondationdentreprisehermes.org for more information.

The French Institute Alliance Française (FIAF) is New York's premiere French cultural and language center. FIAF's mission is to create and offer New Yorkers innovative and unique programs in education and the arts that explore the evolving diversity and richness of French cultures. FIAF seeks to generate new ideas and promote cross cultural dialogue through partnerships and new platforms of expression. Visit www.fiaf.org.

With roots dating back to 1823, the Brooklyn Museum is one of the oldest and largest museums in the United States, with a collection representing nearly every culture, ranging from some of the most important ancient Egyptian works in the nation; to the arts of the Pacific Islands, Asia, Africa, and the Islamic world; to American and European art; to international contemporary works. The Brooklyn Museum is home to the Elizabeth A. Sackler Center for Feminist Art, the only facility of its kind in the country.

Upcoming exhibitions include Soulful Creatures: Animal Mummies in Ancient Egypt; Proof: Francisco Goya, Sergei Eisenstein, Robert Longo; and Roots of "The Dinner Party": History in the Making. The Museum reaches audiences across the country and internationally with a robust schedule of traveling exhibitions, including current tours of Georgia O'Keeffe: Living Modern; Who Shot Sports: A Photographic History, 1843 to the Present; Kehinde Wiley: A New Republic; Divine Felines;and Iggy Pop Life Class by Jeremy Deller. Follow this link for more information: www.brooklynmuseum.org.

The Abrons Arts Center is the Obie award-winning performing and visual arts program of Henry Street Settlement. The Abrons supports the creation and presentation of innovative, multi-disciplinary work; cultivates artists in all stages of their practice with educational programs, mentorships, residencies and commissions; and serves as an intersection of engagement for local, national and international audiences and arts-workers. Visit www.abronsartscenter.org.

Movement Research is one of the world's leading laboratories for the investigation of dance and movement-based forms. Valuing the individual artist, their creative process and their vital role within society, Movement Research is dedicated to the creation and implementation of free and low-cost programs that nurture and instigate discourse and experimentation. Movement Research strives to reflect the cultural, political and economic diversity of its moving community, including artists and audiences alike. Find out more at www.movementresearch.org.