Folie [transmission 2024]

A choreographic extract remodelled by the group Ainsi-Danse, coordinator Armelle Cornillon, as part of the “Danse en amateur et repertoire” programme 2023/2024 (a programme created to assist and promote amateur dancing). Transmission by Claude Brumachon, choreographer, Benjamin Lamarche, assistant, performer
Presented on 15 June 2024, Le Manège de Reims.
The piece when it was created
Folie
Firstly produced 17 November 1989 at L.A.R.C., Centre d’action culturelle, Le Creusot
Choreography: Claude Brumachon
Work for fifteen performers: Mercedes Chanquia, Roxana Del Castillo, Jean-Yves Ginoux, Pascal Guillermie, Boris Jacta, Benjamin Lamarche, Sandrine Lamoine, Yolande Limousin, Anne Minetti, Nick Petit, Véronique Redoux, Fabienne Saint Patrice, Valérie Soulard, Isabelle Tanneau, Sophie Torrion
Music: Christophe Zurfluh
Original duration: 1h
The group
Ainsi-Danse (Villemomble, Île-de-France)
The group Ainsi-Danse brings together amateur and semi-professional dancers from Armelle Cornillon’s company Odela and the Bagnolet conservatory. Its broader project is to revive the memory of the legendary Bagnolet choreography competition: Ballet pour demain. Called Hier c’était demain in tribute to the competition, the project works with French dance heritage from an era when anything seemed possible. It is underpinned by a range of cultural and educational initiatives centred on previous winners the competition. The group chose to stage Folie, a piece created by Claude Brumachon in 1989, one year after he made his winning debut at the competition with the work Texane. 
The project
Originally commissioned by the Val-de-Marne Biennale for the bicentenary of the French Revolution, Folie unleashes its fury right from the beginning with a series of rhythmic respirations. The fifteen bodies on stage seem to have an endless supply of breath and energy. They form a magnificent, ragged horde, propelled into an energetic dance evoking the movements of peoples and women marching for their freedom. A prophetic work, Folie has become an iconic piece of dance repertoire, due to its ongoing resonance. Claude Brumachon and Benjamin Lamarche passed on the work to the group in person. Mindful of the topical nature of the piece, the group practiced regularly in order to learn its singular, powerful, visceral movements.