Karine Ponties
Karine Ponties was born in France in 1967. Her foray into dance began with studies at the Juan Tena and Ramon Soler dance schools in Barcelona, and culminated in her matriculation from Maurice Bejart’s Mudra school in Brussels in 1986.
She has worked as a performer with several companies, notably Frédéric Flamand, Michèle Noiret, Nicole Mossoux / Patrick Bonté and Pierre Droulers among others, in addition to founding Dame de Pic / Cie Karine Ponties in 1995. In 1996 the company premiered at Théâtre Le Public in Brussels, and shortly thereafter Karine Ponties was honored with the laureate of the 4th Edition of Les Pépinières européennes for young artists.
In her over 20 years of choreographing for the Company, she has created over forty works including commissions for the Helsinki Theater Dance Department, Lod in Ghent, the D.C.M. Foundation in Bucharest, Montréal Danse, La Petite Fabrique in Paris, Transdance Europe 03-06 and the Moscow Ballet. She was one of seven European choreographers selected to participate in the EU-Russian contemporary dance project, Intradance (2010) with the creation of Mirliflor that was awarded the Golden Mask 2011 (National Theatre Award in Russia) for the best contemporary dance performance. The attention garnered around her work at this time later led to her collaboration with the contemporary section of the Moscow Ballet for piece “Every Direction is North”, which was awarder the 2016 Golden Mask for best contemporary dance performance.
Ponties’ award-winning collaborations with visual artist Thierry Van Hasselt (Brutalis: 2002 Société des Auteurs et Compositeurs Dramatiques [SACD] choreographic prize; and Holeulone: named 2007 best dance performance in French-speaking Belgium) highlight the company’s commitment to interdisciplinary exploration.
Other collaborations include composer Jan Kuijken and Lod (Les Taroupes 2000, Capture d’un caillot 2001, Brutalis 2002); composer Dominique Pauwels and Lod (Le Chant d’amour du grand singe 2005, Mi non Sabir 2004, Desirabilis 2004, Holeulone 2006, Boreas 2007), visual artist Lawrence Malstaf (Boreas 2007) and visual artist and illustrator Stefano Ricci (the Scarecrow Cycle 2008-2011, gathering babil, havran, Fidèle à l’éclair, Benedetto Pacifico and Humus vertebra).
Known for works with a flair for the absurd, exploring intimacy and interlacing relationships, Ponties choreographies have toured nationally and internationally, notably at the Festival de la Cité (Lausanne), Tanec Praha (Prague), Julidans Theatre Bellevue (Amsterdam), Szene Festival (Salzburg), Dublin Fringe Festival, Centre Culturel Wallonie-Bruxelles (Paris), Neuer Tanz Festival (Freiburg), Dansstationen (Malmö), City Theater Reykjavik (Iceland), Plesni Theater (Ljubljana), Les Hivernales d’Avignon, Les Brigittines (Brussels), Agora de la danse (Montreal), O Espaço do Tempo (Portugal), Pavillon Noir – National Choreographic Center of Aix-en-Provence, One Yellow Rabbit Festival (Calgary), Théâtre des Salins – Scène Nationale (Martigues), Festival de Marseille (France), International Dance Festival of Cochabamba (Bolivia), National Theatre of Korea (Seoul), National Choreographic Center of Orléans, Théâtre de la Ville (Paris), Mimos Festival (Périgueux), Uzès Danse, Kaaitheater (Brussels), Dance New Amsterdam (New York), Festival de Otoño (Madrid), Dance Week Festival (Zagreb), Vooruit (Ghent), Théâtre de la Cité (Paris).
