Theatre Junction presents Benoît Lachambre’s SNAKESKINS

Snakeskins is Benoît Lachambre’s newest creation - a reptilian metaphor about moulting, with an emphasis on the result and decomposition over time. We had the opportunity to ask him a few questions, but first, a little background…(See below for the Q&A with Lachambre).

“Benoît Lachambre is one of those rare artists whose conceptual rigour is matched with freedom and anarchy,” said Mark Lawes, Artistic Director of Theatre Junction. “Snakeskins is dialed into the sublime realm of the collective unconscious and personal transformation.”

This solo (- or so-called ‘fake’ solo, because he is accompanied on stage by the dancer Daniele Albanese and the musician/ multi-instrumentalist Hahn Rowe), offers the choreographer the opportunity to sharpen the strong lines of his work. With multiple variations and amplitudes of movements, the body is transformed by minute alterations of symmetry and balance.

With Snakeskins Lachambre opens himself up as never before in a performance, making his own skin a surface of resistance to any formatted idea.

Multi-instrumentalist Hahn Rowe composed the music for Snakeskins, and performs live during the show. He is an internationally renowned violinist, guitarist, composer, and engineer/producer involved in a wide range of projects. His uniquely personal sonic language fuses disparate musical elements into atmospheric, sensual, and polymorphic soundscapes. He has worked with Hugo Largo, David Byrne, Antony and the Johnsons, Hassan Hakmoun, Yoko Ono, Glenn Branca, Moby, Swans, Foetus, and R.E.M., among many others.

Par B.L.eux is a contemporary dance company founded in 1996 by the Montreal based choreographer. Internationally beaming, Par B.L.eux is mandated to promote international exchange and multiply opportunities for encounters between artists from diverse artistic and geographic backgrounds.

Winner of the Grand Prix de la danse de Montréal 2013 for the presentation of Snakeskins, Lachambre’s kinesthetic approach to movement and improvisation leaves its marks on his choreography. With a prolific body of work, including 17 works since the foundation of Par B.L.eux, participation in more than 20 other productions and the choreography of 25 commissioned works, Lachambre devotes himself to an exploratory approach of movement and its sources with the aim to seek the authenticity of the gesture.

Q&A with creator of Snakeskins, Benoît Lachambre: 

What was your inspiration for the show?

I did have several inspirations for Snakeskins: the first one being a somatic exercise named the water snake, in which by undulating the spine while releasing the muscles around it, one feels like the spine becomes a swimming snake with water flowing around its body. The sensation could also be named and identified as a kind of shedding. It’s that shedding sensation that started the interest to work on a transformative dance.

What can people expect when they come see it?

There are three performers in this work. People can expect to perceive different degrees of presence, hear the live music of Hahn Rowe. Reflect about and sense: Affect, space, energy, body modulation and notion of existence. Witness a transformative dance and several states of being. Dream of their own personal rituals in regards to transformations.

Why should they come see it?

Out of an open mind and receptive state of being.

And anything else you’d like to add?

We love to perform this work!!! We are definitely looking forward to our arrival!!!

Catch SNAKESKINS March 2 - 5, 2016. 

Tickets are on sale at theatrejunction.com or 403.205.2922

Photo credit www.christinerosedivito.com

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