RECONOCER

In ReconocerOur aim is not to juxtapose writing and juggling, but to work at the crossroads of our practices, to invent a common ground where each moves and is transformed by contact with the other. A roll of paper provides a concrete meeting point: an apparatus, a medium for writing and manipulation, where text and body respond to each other. The aim is to experience the dramaturgy of a text through a circus body, and to use the writing to create a space for juggling.

Dramaturgically, the project revolves around a fragmentary form built around the question of lies, of what cannot be said, of the unmentionable. We see lies not only in their moral dimension, but also as fictional material: a space for projection, fantasy and the creation of narratives. Reconocer is made up of successive tableaux, offering partial, incomplete and contradictory narratives. Together, body and text question the narrative pact. What do we choose to say? What do we create to tell our story? Where does fiction begin?

A lot of work to do

Apolline Gille Malézé and Simón Aravena meet in 2020at Université Paris 8 Vincennes – Saint-Denisthrough teacher-researcher and performer Chloé Déchéry. Simón and Apolline write Reconocerbased on their respective practices, a first form at the crossroads of contemporary circus, playwriting and the visual arts, in search of superimpositions and juxtapositions.

For Apolline, author and playwright, Reconocer affirms his desire to be on stage and to think of dramaturgy as an embodied practice, traversed by the body. Her writing focuses particularly on the body. This project allows her to explore these research questions (How does writing make the body? When does a writing space become a stage?) in a very direct way, in dialogue with circus practice.

For Simón, this project represents a new stage in his juggling career, enabling him to experiment with a different approach to juggling, in relation to text and orality.

Based in Rennes, Brittany, Du pain sur la planche was formed in 2024 for this first joint creation. Du pain sur la planche defines itself as a space for research and sharing, welcoming multi-disciplinary projects that propose new physical, textual, visual or scenic languages. Its work is rooted in a reflection on dramaturgies and hybrid forms of writing. The aim is to create spaces for dialogue and exchange on our research, practices and questions, with a view to sharing and transmitting knowledge, tools and experience. Mireille Losco, Professor of Theatre Studies at the École Nationale Supérieure des Arts et Techniques du Théâtre and member of the Passages laboratory. XX-XXI of Lyon 2 University, is its president.