Alban Richard

Alban Richard discovered contemporary dance while studying literature and music. From the end of the 1990s, he worked for various choreographers, including Odile Duboc, Olga de Soto and Rosalind Crisp. In 2000, he founded Ensemble l’Abrupt and created some thirty pieces, all of which developed a close relationship with a musical work whose writing and formal structure he reinterpreted; each production opened up into new research and a gestural language that differed from the previous one. The way in which he develops his shows, composing the choreography through constrained improvisations, encourages the performers to become creators of their own dance. He has collaborated with Ensemble Alla Francesca, Les Talens Lyriques, Ensemble Intercontemporain, L’Instant Donné, as well as with composers Arnaud Rebotini, Erwan Keravec, Paul Clift and Matthew Barnson. Since 2015, he has been artistic director of the Centre Chorégraphique National de Caen en Normandie.

The potential of the situation
“Observe, continue, modify, imagine. I want to share tools with the campers for producing movements based on the observation of the favourable conditions of each situation. The situation being the resource that we must know how to develop. How do we remain open? How do we not project but detect possibilities, not model (have a plan), but nurture to maturity (not to deprive oneself of any possibility). In the form of experimentation and improvisation workshops, working from the constraints of observing bodies in movement, the participants will work on trusting themselves and the effectiveness of their choices.” Alban Richard

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