Compagnie Marie Chouinard Perform At The Cyham Theater 4/4

The Pittsburgh Dance Council is proud to present two spectacularly innovative works, Prelude to the Afternoon of a Faun and The Rite of Spring, performed by Montreal-based Compagnie Marie Chouinard on Saturday, April 4, 2009 at 8:00 p.m. at the Byham Theater.

About Compagnie Marie Chouinard
Quebec native Marie Chouinard has always been fascinated by the body as a vehicle for art and as art itself, striving to depict the body's power, in form and function, as well as the silence and breath that make up the invisible facets of life. Since 1978, Chouinard has created over fifty choreographic productions, action-performances, vocal works, installations, and films that have solidified her reputation for expressive originality.
After twelve years of solo performance, Marie Chouinard founded Compagnie Marie Chouinard in 1990 in Montreal, and has since choreographed over a dozen works that attempt to "tune" the body's vital pulsations and position the company as a fixture on the world's most prestigious stages. Compagnie Marie Chouinard comprises ten dancers who explore the body in refreshing, raw, and at times troubling ways, employing dance, acting, and vocal techniques, where each movement carries meaning intrinsically embedded in the body. Compagnie Marie Chouinard is "a breath of fresh air, or rather a tornado of uninhibited imagination" (The New York Times).
For her immense contributions to modern dance, Marie Chouinard has been awarded a New York Performance Award (a Bessie) and has recently been appointed Officer of the Order of Canada, the country's highest honor for lifetime achievement.

About Prelude to the Afternoon of a Faun
In 1994, the Compagnie Marie Chouinard was invited to perform Afternoon of a Faun and The Rite of Spring at the Taipei International Dance Festival in Taiwan. However, festival organizers encouraged Chouinard to create a new solo version of Afternoon of a Faun, this time set to the music of composer Claude Debussy. The result became known as Prelude to the Afternoon of a Faun, a dance that maintains the same gestures and sequences as Marie Chouinard's initial work. This eleven-minute sequence perfectly embodies the raw sensuality of the symbolic Mallarmé poem, which describes a faun's sexual encounters with several nymphs in a dream-like monologue.
During the performance, a two-dimensional, Egyptian-like human figure mimics the faun's movements and shafts of light represent the objects of his growing fantasy. The dancers expertly convey Chouinard's view of the body as a sacred vessel for pure movement and endless kinetic possibility, a combination that makes for an astounding, powerful performance. Village Voice praises this masterpiece as "savage and infinitely refined...terrifying, exhilarating, mysterious, immediate."

About The Rite of Spring
Amidst Marie Chouinard's vast body of work, The Rite of Spring represents an important milestone as her first choreography based on a pre-existing musical score. Set to Igor Stravinsky's music, the cadence and force of the beat inspire, accompany, and energize the dancers' movements, forming both the echo and the musical counterpoint for an organic, vigorous, and vivid piece of choreography. Since its creation in 1993, The Rite of Spring has often been praised as an avant-garde work renowned for its compelling interpretation of the moment when life begins. "For me, (The Rite of Spring) is one of the most exciting pieces of Marie's to perform," says company dancer Lucie Mongrain. "[It's] that moment of conception or the big bang or a plant starting to grow - all of those aspects of creation and that one second where life begins."
The piece opens at the dawn of time, progressing into a series of solos inspired by the various moods of Stravinsky's dynamic music. However, the paradox lies in Chouinard's sensuality of ritualized sacrifice positioned alongside the androgynous nature of the dancers. Male and female dancers remain undifferentiated in dress and movement, yet perform with an intense display of sexuality. Revealing the complex, desirous, and cerebral nature of humanity, this forty-nine minute piece exposes the intimate mystery of each dancer through strong, clear movements and breathtaking solos. "Marie Chouinard's The Rite of Spring is dazzling."(Le Nouvel observateur).
Compagnie Marie Chouinard's The Rite of Spring contains nudity.

Ticket Information: Tickets ($40.50, $32.50, $25.50, $19.50) may be purchased at the Box Office at Theater Square, online at www.pgharts.org, or by calling (412) 456-6666. Pittsburgh Dance Council's media sponsor is WDUQ90.5fm.

Each year the Pittsburgh Dance Council, a division of The Pittsburgh Cultural Trust, showcases a world-class season of dance. As the largest presenter of international performances in the city, the Dance Council continues to help make our Cultural District one of the country's leading arts and entertainment centers.

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