‘Arabfuturism Performances’

Arabfuturism is a programme initiated by Mahmoud Darwish Chair.

​​​​​​​PERFORMANCE
Effeminate Pharaoh - Première - 30’ 
A lecture performance by Monira Al Qadiri
(video, sound, text)​​​​​​​

“Your hand is in my hand, my body trembles with joy, my heart is exalted, because we walk together.” (Ancient Egyptian love poem, New Kingdom 16-11 century BC)
 
Two pairs of hands are clasped together for 3500 years. It is said they are of a heretic king and his wife, who were deeply enamoured by one another. After their downfall, most of their effigies, artifacts and relics were destroyed or erased from history, but through some magic incantation, these hands remained intact. Like a totem of burning passion, they stand as a testament to our need to touch. A towering symbol of our yearning for intimacy. Time and time again, disease, war and erasure ravage our shared sense of being in the world. But, like a bearded female pharaoh and her architect lover, our desire burrows tunnels deep into the ground so that our tombs can cross paths, and our ghosts can meet again in the afterlife. 
​​​​​​​
​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​Monira Al Qadiri (Berlin) is a Kuwaiti visual artist born in Senegal and educated in Japan. In 2010, she received a Ph.D. in inter-media art from Tokyo University of the Arts, where her research was focused on the aesthetics of sadness in the Middle-East stemming from poetry, music, art and religious practices.  Her work explores unconventional gender identities, petro-cultures and their possible futures, as well as the legacies of corruption.

Credits : By & with Monira Al Qadiri
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PERFORMANCE
Épisode #3 "Private" – 40’ 
A dance performance by & with Malika Djardi (Lyon)
≥ Épisode #3 "Private" – Approx 30’
 

Épisode is designed in a short series format, extending the choreographer’s research into the genre of science fiction and multiple human languages. In a world obsessed with technology, the question of emotion is central. Malika Djardi develops a universe steeped in science fiction, in which dance is the ultimate human language. Based on the concept of anomie, she unfolds a scenario in the form of a dialogue with an artificial intelligence as it seeks to understand the mechanisms that give rise to subjective human sensations. This premise questions the need for language as a tool of domination and emancipation. 

Originally from Lyon, Malika Djardi trained in contemporary dance at UQAM in Montreal and at the National Center of Contemporary Dance in Angers from 2009 to 2011. 
For the Biennale of Charleroi Danse (BE) in 2017, she imagined the conference piece 3 addressing the science fiction genre and the question of emotions in a disillusioned fertility ritual. Episode, conceived as a short series format, extends this reflection. 
The first episode was presented at the Brigittines in Brussels (BE) in June 2019 as part of Memories of the XXIInd Century. The piece will premiere at Les Subsistances in Lyon (FR) in December 2021.

Credits:
​​​​​​​Épisode #3 "Private" - 30'
Conception, chorégraphie  et argument: Malika Djardi 
Montage sonore: Malika Djardi avec Sydney Valette
Création musicale: Sydney Valette
Voix: Chloé Hamdaoui, Céleste Narducci et Yassir Moujtazi
Création lumière: Thomas Laigle 
Costumes: Marie Colin-Madan et Heley
Régie lumière: Gwenaël Laroche
Régie son: Pierre-Aimé Ballot