Surface de réparation
Creation in Théâtre de Gennevilliers on October 2007
In Gennevilliers
“For several years now, my projects have involved working with people from other artistic disciplines, some from completely outside the arts. For me, this mixing with others defines the very essence of the creative process, giving me the possibility to encounter different imaginations and sensitivities, and to work while accepting differences and contradictions.
Being able to work on long-term projects with the Gennevilliers Theatre gives me the opportunity to pursue this approach, and to work on bringing art to the local people which is in tune with their everyday habits. In fact, this is why is I constantly develop new creation paradigms tailored to the people I work with. For example, with the project “De Arbitre à Zébra”, I worked with boxers and wrestlers in Reims who, together with artists and other sports enthusiasts, devised new areas for both training and rehearsing as well as for the championship and the final show culminating in a proposal, open to the public, exploring the depiction of violence in our societies. In this way, the locals and artists worked together to create a certain vision of the world, comparing and contrasting their differences and sensitivities.
When I first started working in Gennevilliers, I considered that, once again, it would be interesting to go and see sports enthusiasts. And indeed, the number of young people practicing sport regularly and intensively, and the quality of the sports facilities in the general vicinity of the theatre is impressive. Local young men and women use these facilities to forge a part of their personality via the rites and practices of sporting disciplines and so become a focus of economic, social and identity-related challenges. Sport leads to the expression of identification by means of the values which it conveys. The practicing of sport, the media coverage of sport and the many supporters of sport combine to create local and national identities,
which act on the social cohesion of our modern societies. These are all concepts which I consider important to explore with the people directly concerned”.
Rachid Ouramdane
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“De Arbitre à Zébra” is a program with performance and installations co-produced by the Manège – Scène nationale de Reims, under the management
of Stéphanie Aubin, (2001) as part of the program “Dimanche des Curiosités”.
The association Fin Novembre / Julie Nioche & Rachid Ouramdane were artists in residence at the Manège de Reims from 2000 to 2004.
