Hauts Cris (miniature)

2005

I am the bloody field where the hostile fury / vomits the red murder and the scytic horror / that plunders the blood, the wealth of my heart.
Agrippa d’Aubigné – The Spring

He is alone, in a space too small for him, and each of his movements resonates in an extraordinary fashion, as if each displacement, however small, was weighted down with an enormous tension. Around him, the convivial space of a dining room seems to be crushed by his presence and ready to shatter. Between this space and the public, a tree trunk is lying on the floor and serves as a screen on which is projected a poem by Agrippa d’Aubigné. Hit by the dancer, the tree trunk turns out to be a wooden drum. Perhaps it is about finding physical musicality to the poem, a sort of polyphonic counterpoint – body, voice, noises – to these alexandrines loaded with horror and revolt. Perhaps it is also about finding a space, like one of these "miniatures" of medieval times painted on a piece of wood which frees the subconscious from its traumas and helps it transform its complaint.

Hauts Cris (miniature) works on different scales of the representation of Space and Sound to reveal an interior state linked to the scream. The body constitutes the principal vector, the catalyst of Space and Sound: the space with its exaggerated perspectives offers him precise visibility and reveals certain zones of tension. The Sound, and particularly vocal sound, compels him to find his lines of force in order to impose his course. This double combination, body-space and body-sound, is the basis of Hauts Cris (miniature), and finds its singularity in its permanent interaction.

All around the head
Open the mouth to expel the air reserve from the lungs.
Open the mouth to start inhaling the air that’s around the head.
Finish through the nose to fill the lungs completely, thinking clearly about relaxing the diaphragm, expanding the ribs and not blocking the throat.
Once the air that surrounded the head fills the lungs, and before beginning the expelling remain vigilant so that everything stays fluid.
Now concentrate all of the energy into one single goal: breathe out all of the air that was around the head a few seconds ago as far away as possible, so that you won’t breathe it in again.

Hauts Cris (miniature) was created on October 14th 2005 at the Laboratoires d’Aubervilliers.

Cast

Conceived and performed by: Vincent Dupont
Music, sound: Thierry Balasse
Light design: Yves Godin
Text : Agrippa d’Aubigné
Voice work: Valérie Joly
Set: Boris Jean
Stage manager: Sylvain Giraudeau
Light manager: Arnaud Lavisse
Sound manager: Maxime Fabre
Artistic collaboration: Myriam Lebreton

Production

Production: J’y pense souvent (...)
Coproduction $: Les Laboratoires d’AubervilliersLa Muse en Circuit, Centre de création musicale en Île-de-FranceCNDC Angers, dir. Emmanuelle HuynhCCN Tours, dir. Bernardo MontetARCADI.
With the support of: DRAC Île-de-France, Ministry of Culture and CommunicationDICREAM, Centre national de la cinématographieLes Spectacles vivants, Centre Pompidou (Paris)La Ménagerie de verre/Studiolab (Paris).

Press

© Photo – Linde Van Raeschelder