Spoken word/body

The body in the works of Martin Bélanger is not just an instrument for communication. The presence of the body in itself has a significant meaning in the work of the choreographer.

The production Spoken word/body also is a tribute to the spoken word, the storytelling and capturing of the audience’s attention with few effects. Sound technician Jean-Sebastian Durocher and Martin Bélanger grabs this attention and become storytellers of two languages, the body’s and the words’.

Canadian Martin Bélanger has been examining dance since 1992. He has a bachelor degree in dance from the University in Quebec and experience as an actor in theatre and movie productions, among other things.

Martin Bélanger says the following about Spoken word/body:

"This show may be viewed as a poeticised document on the body-consciousness relationship and on potential developments the future may hold for the body. Here, the narrator's body may serve as a source of visual support to give expression to these developments. The dual, dichotomous function of narrator and moving body-subject seemed rich and amusing to me. Inevitably, the theme also reveals some of my personal concerns.

It is important to me, through the moments of shared intimacy a show brings, to universalise the identity and history of the person who steps forward; this gives viewers something to identify with in their own lives. This is a tribute to the spoken word, to the act of telling stories and sharing one's life with the help of very little. Finally, it is a means of expressing my fascination with what psychoanalyst-essayist Julia Kristeva so aptly dubs 'this heterogeneous combination that is the speaking organism.'"

Source:

BIT Teatergarasjen, Oktoberdans 2004. 24.11.2010: http://www.bit-teatergarasjen.no -arkiv