Vincent Dupont & Charles Ayats

Real or virtual? No need to choose, in this augmented-reality performance which offers both options; the project was conceived within the Chimères program initiated by the Ministry of Culture for artists seeking to break out of the “classical framework”. Choreographer Vincent Dupont and interactive designer Charles Ayats combine stage dance and VR’s many possibilities. Following a structure echoing that of the 2010 piece Souffles created by Dupont around the theme of death, spectators can experience a dual reality: they can opt to use the glasses provided for the piece or not, therefore choosing between two different performance spaces offered simultaneously. No Reality now is formally innovative and tackles existential questions – the mysteries of life and mourning rituals, led by a trio composed of Death, the Deceased and the Shaman, who are made incredibly vibrant by the staging. A fascinating immersive piece, which paves the way for a new stage language.  

Vincent Dupont

Vincent Dupont started out as an actor, and worked with Thierry Thieû Niang and Georges Appaix, and participated in pieces by Boris Charmatz. He created his first choreographic piece in 2001, Jachères improvisations, and has continued to work with other artists ever since, while pursuing his own investigations in work that unsettles traditional definitions of choreography. He was associated artist from 2015 to 2019 with ICI-Centre chorégraphique national de Montpellier, and he has been associated artist with the Centre des Arts d’Enghien-les-Bains from September 2019 to 2023.

Charles Ayats

Charles Ayats is an author, director and immersive and interactive experiences designer. He was selected by the Haiku Interactif Arte/ ONF open call with Phi, and he is interested in innovative projects focusing on mediation – web documentaries (Check-in, Pas si bêtes les Animaux, Tati Express...), or video gaming such as Type:Rider, a playful triptych on the history of typography which he co-directed in 2013. He is constantly seeking for new storytelling forms and he participates in many hackathons to learn more and train in new techniques (Cifap, Gobelins, Dixit, INA). He is fascinated by virtual reality and he adapted Marc-Antoine Mathieu’s graphic novel SENS (2016), and co-wrote 7 Lives, an interactive VR tale directed by Jan Kounen (2019), and Le Cri (2019), inspired by Edvard Munch’s painting. In 2020 he created M.O.A, a short augmented-reality film adapted from Alain Damasio’s novel Les Furtifs, and he continues to research narration, bodies and spatiality with pieces connected to live performance like Colonie.s and No reality now.