A piece for two male dancers and animated ink.
Holeulone develops the bond between movement and images at the mercy of visions linked on the stage by the animated film by Thierry Van Hasselt.
Choreographed by Karine Ponties, the piece delves into the mental, interior world of a troubled man, into the changing rhythms of his thoughts, his real and imaginary memories, the clarity and confusion of his perceptions. At one moment, his twin appears — a kind of interior historian so similar to himself that he becomes unbearable…
The performance is loosely inspired by Charlie, the endearing, simple witted hero of the Flowers for Algernon, Daniel Keyes’ novel, published in 1959. The two dancers fight with themselves, with each other, interlace or surrender. The complex intimacy of their duo is projected not only through their own physicality with but also through the filmic images in which they are often immersed during the performance.
Karine Ponties in response to questions from Gwenola David on the occasion of the performance of Holeulone at the Théâtre de la Ville (Paris):
“What moves me in the novel Flowers for Algernon is the edgy sensitivity of the main character, Charlie. The preoccupations and energy that colour his desire for change and understanding are formidable and sensitive enough to try to develop them in the body, in bodies.
The constant energy in this book is similar to the energy we spend developing our work, a creative process in constant motion. In order to translate and transpose this energy with as much conviction and determination as the book’s main character, we tirelessly seek, both physically and mentally, to make another narrative of our doubts, our failures and our hopes.
The narrative that drives Flowers for Algernon is one that could affect any of us, when at a moment in our lives we find ourselves displaced, off-balance, having lost status and position, whatever this might be, and yet at the same time able to act with awareness and insight into our own rise and downfall, decay and degeneration.
All these changes of consciousness, these accelerations and decelerations of thought, these memories real or imagined, acuity and the confusion of these perceptions, that such a situation may bring about is profoundly human.
These are the elements that interest me in all my work.”
Holeulone was awarded the French Community of Belgium’s Critics Prize for the best dance performance of 2007.
