Dancer, performer and choreographer, Aina Alegre is an artist from Vilafranca del Penedès who lives between the Catalan capital and Paris and who, after joining the CNDC in Angers in 2007, embarked on a brilliant career that led her to create her own company, STUDIO FICTIF, and to co-direct the Centre Chorégraphique National de Grenoble with performer Yannick Hugron since January of this year. Alegre, who sees dance as a terrain for "re-imagining" the body, has explored diverse body cultures and practises in her creations, examining the social, historical, and anthropological role through visual arts, sound, and audiovisual works. And, whereas in previous choreographies, she experimented with sound and the relationship with the body, in THIS IS NOT «an act of love & resistance», the artist focuses the choreography on the element that surrounds us and is always present, even if we are not aware of it: air and the dependence on it of bodies through which it constantly flows.
How can we generate energy from this element, and how can we all breathe together? What imaginaries and future representations would emerge if the air carried omens? Aina Alegre poses this question through gesture, movement, and sound. A hybrid sensory universe surrounds the spectators. It has been imagined by a regular accomplice of the choreographer, the musician and composer Josep Tutusaus, creator of electronic soundscapes that will also make us vibrate with live brass music inspired by brass bands. All this to imagine, under Jan Fedinger's illumination, how bodies connect and in this way rethink the concept of community.
THIS IS NOT (an act of love & resistance) is the new creation by Aina Alegre, an artist we have seen in Barcelona as part of the Dansa Metropolitana programme in venues such as the now-defunct Sala Hiroshima (where she was an associate artist) and at the Mercat de les Flors, performing pieces such as LA NUIT, NOS AUTRES, or R-A-U-X-A, which, along with Concrerto, are among her latest creations. The première of the piece coincides with the recent appointment of the Barcelona-born dancer and choreographer as co-director, together with dancer Yannick Hugron, of the Centre Chorégraphique National de Grenoble, replacing Yoann Bourgeois.
A co-production of the Centre choréographique national de Grenoble and Grec 2023 Festival of Barcelona.
Other co-producers and partners: STUDIO FICTIF (Claire Nollez, Romain Courault, Clémence Padou); Grec 2023 Festival de Barcelona; December Dance (Cultuurcentrum and Concertgebouw Brugge), Bélgica; Mercat de les Flors, Barcelona – associate artist 2022 & 2023; La Rose des Vents, Scène nationale Lille Métropole Villeneuve d'Ascq; Le Manège, scène nationale de Maubeuge; La Place de la Danse CDCN Toulouse Occitanie; La Briqueterie CDCN du Val-de-Marne; Théâtre et cinéma de Choisy-le-Roi Scène conventionnée; Theater Freiburg, Germany; Transfabrik Fund - Franco-German Fund for the Performing Arts, Atelier de Paris / CDCN.
With the support of the Patronage Caisse des Dépôts; DRAC Île-de-France; Département du Val de Marne; Région I ̂le-de-France; Adami, organisation for the management of artists’ rights; SACD stage music fund; CNDC, Angers; The Centre chorégraphique national de Grenoble is financed by Drac Auvergne - Rhône-Alpes/Ministère de la culture et de la communication Grenoble-Alpes Métropole, Département de l’Isère, Région Auvergne – Rhône-Alpes.
Conception and artistic direction: Aina Alegre. With: Maria Astallé, Maria Cofan, Cosima Grand, Hanna Hedmann, Kotomi Nishiwaki, Maria Puertas, Gwendal Raymond, Julia Soler, Asha Thomas. Lighting design: Jan Fedinger. Sound design: Josep Tutusaus. Sound manager: Guillaume Olmeta. Artistic advisor and dramaturgy: Quim Bigas. Sound design: Vanessa Court. Costumes: Andrea Otin. Choreography assistance: Yannick Hugron, Aniol Busquets. Stage management: Juliette Rudent-Gili. Acknowledgements: Especially Enric Alegre, whose song better future blues accompanied the creation from beginning to end, Pere Jou, Elsa Dumontel.
