Vortex Temporum

Anne Teresa De Keersmaeker / Rosas & Ictus

In Vortex Temporum Anne Teresa De Keersmaeker takes on the polyphony in Gérard Grisey’s eponymous masterpiece with a danced counterpoint for seven dancers. Probing the question: ‘how can you visualise polyphony by dancing it?’. De Keersmaeker decided to stage an intricate intertwining of sound and movement. Each dancer is linked to one of the seven musicians, and colours his or her dancing with patterns of movement proper to the instrument. Both the dancers and musicians travel the stage following a pattern – a vortex – of swirling circles. As De Keersmaeker observes: ‘Time can be thought of as both linear and cyclical. That which we call ‘now’ is, in fact, a permanent tipping point; a balancing act between memory and anticipation, leaning back and forth between the ghost image of the past and a desire towards the future.’

Choreography
Anne Teresa De Keersmaeker

Created with and danced by
Boštjan Antončič, Carlos Garbin, Marie Goudot, Cynthia Loemij, Julien Monty, Michael Pomero, Igor Shyshko

Music
Vortex Temporum, Gérard Grisey (1996)

Music director
Georges-Elie Octors

Musicians
Ictus

Piano
Jean-Luc Plouvier
Flute
Michael Schmid/Chryssi Dimitriou
Clarinet
Dirk Descheemaeker
Violin
Igor Semenoff
Viola
Jeroen Robbrecht
Cello
Geert De Bièvre

Light design
Anne Teresa De Keersmaeker, Luc Schaltin

Artistic advisor light
Michel François

Costumes
Anne-Catherine Kunz

Musical dramaturgy
Bojana Cvejić

Sound
Alexandre Fostier

Production
Rosas

Coproduction
De Munt / La Monnaie (Brussels), Ruhrtriennale, Les Théâtres de la Ville de Luxembourg, Théâtre de la Ville (Paris), Sadler’s Wells (London), Opéra de Lille, ImpulsTanz (Vienna), Holland Festival (Amsterdam), Concertgebouw Brugge (Bruges)

World Premiere
Ruhrtriennale, October 3, 2013