RAZZIAS, CRÉATION FMA 2004

FMA Retrospective – Webcast of the FMA 2004 original production “Razzias” (Raids)

Caracalla Dance theater & l’École Nationale de ballet contemporain du Québec

A spectacular show, co-directed by the choreographer Ireni Stamou (Québec) and Alissar Caracalla (Lebanon), Razzias unites the Orientalist Dance Company of Caracalla of Caracalla Institute, and the National Ballet school of Québec. The project tends to find a shared approach between the energy and the creativity of two groups that have a completely different style. Both the oriental and the western contemporary dance schools express the same theme in different and independent ways. They do meet at certain points, but they avoid the traditional way of fusion.

Without decorum or an ostentatious reminder of a certain culture, and with only pure movement, the creators of Razzias create a space where the encounter is, above all, spontaneous and suggestive. The show reconstructs two moments of historical raids in a contemporary style. During those historical moments, laws, science, philosophies, techniques, rhythms, movements and style, all overlapped, confronted one another and connected. The two raids that brought centuries of confrontation and cultural exchange. From Flamenco and Andalusian mouashah to ballet and opera, the conquerors were traced.

Being at the “height” of our times, we question the famous conqueror’s dream of the East and the universal passions of the wise caliphs; we bring back images that lead us to the Other, the intruder inside of us. In Razzias, we liberate ourselves from the “sacred body” and its Gregorian memory in order to liberate the new human being of today. It’s a contemporary choreography in which we dare to dance together, the self and the Other at the same time, in an open and alternative time and place which transform the extreme violence in the world into new movements.