Into the silence

YP — The fundamentals of this method lie in the notions of rotation, of “space-in-between”, of weight transfer, of the quality of rebound on the floor, of an orchestral body in dialogue with the upper and lower parts of the body... Until now, Practice was mainly used to warm up dancers and develop their physical level and presence, and is now at the heart of my creation. 

Into the silence: what kind of title is that for a piece (consisting of a solo and a duet) that relies heavily on music? 

YP — I’d rather translate it as “Towards peace”, with the image of two hands clasping in a meeting and agreement, two hands that find each other in difference. In a disorientated and violent age, I wanted to give the audience and the dancers, through dance and music, something peaceful, a possible harmony, an agreement.

The piece is also a return to a smaller format, articulated in two parts: a female duo and a male solo. I chose dancers who have worked with me for a long time. The solo resonates with Bach’s unique instrument, and the duo of two dancers, with very different expressive registers. The duet invites a dialogue towards a possible accord of space between them.

The reduced set-up will also make it possible to perform in non-performance venues such as museums or other public spaces. Having said that, the stage remains essential to my creative process: I love the depth of this “black box”, its depth of field, which is like a magic box. For this piece, there’s no set, but we work with LEDs and lines of light: it’s the light that creates space and light trajectories.  

How did you actually work with the three dancers? 

YP — I created the initial choreographic material from these images of sound loops, which for me evoked rotations, the DNA double helix... Then, with the emotional expressiveness I sensed in the pieces, I enriched the movement vocabulary. The material is also nourished by the personalities of each of the dancers, with their own technical and artistic specificities. The work is tailor-made for them. In concrete terms, there’s a phase where I give them the material and the dancers transform it through various tasks, and then I take this material and write the composition.

Do you also literally set Bach’s music in motion? 

YP — Yes, I love the idea of listening on several levels. In this case, there are three: the classical one of diffusion by loudspeakers at the front and back of the stage; a loudspeaker that the dancers can move around the stage; and, finally, a mini loudspeaker with mono sound that adds a third plane of diffusion. These three layers of sound can create different relationships of force, variations in the relationship between music and dance. It’s a device I’ve already used for some of my pieces: Loom, Ply... I want the dance to lead the music, not the other way round. The sound space is created by the dancers. Even more profoundly, the dancer’s commitment creates a space, and for me there is an ethical importance to the danced gesture.

Once again, this piece doesn’t seem to have a fixed narrative? 

Inspired by the notion of lines and curves in nature, like traces and threads, I’m most interested in the living, organic body that reacts to music that evokes for me a landscape, nature... There’s almost something animal about the movements, beyond the beautiful and the ugly. It’s a question of getting as close as possible to life in its rhythms, movements and sense of time... 

— Interview by Jean-Emmanuel Denave, journalist, September 2024