the impatience of interconnected youth

AKZAK is a new original production by Héla Fattoumi and Éric Lamoureux.

Most of the young dancers they have gathered hail from the African continent: Burkina Faso, Morocco, and Tunisia. Together, they form a “block” of intertwined singularities, inscribing the dance piece within its political dimension, like a catalyst for notions of hospitality, fraternity, solidarity between peoples in order to reactivate an “imaginative and listening agency.”

Dancing together

For almost thirty years, Héla Fattoumi and Éric Lamoureux have been following an approach articulated around a dialogue between the North and the South.

The choreographic duo has forged ties with emerging structures dedicated to contemporary dance. In Ouagadougou, with choreographers Salia Sanou and Seydou Boro, founders of the Centre de Developpement Chorégraphique La Termitière, they have created the conditions for the emergence of VIAOUAGA, a project created in partnership with the Yeelen Don training program bringing together around twenty young dancers. They have developed similar links in Morocco, with choreographer Taoufiq Izeddiou, founder of the On Marche festival and initiator of the Al Mokhtabar [“the laboratory”] training program, since renamed Nafass [“air,” “breathing”] in Marrakech. In Tunisia, they are in contact with several figures, such as Imed Jeamaa and Syhem Belkodja, as well as Marwen Errouine and Carthage Dance Days, all of which are actively engaged in the history of contemporary dance and contributing to its diversity. All them, as Africans from this vast continent, are however confronted with political and economic hurdles that hinder the pursuit of their work and particularly prevent them from travelling outside of their country. Young African performers are often self-taught and often hold multiple jobs while taking part in trainings and workshops in contemporary dance.