French Culture

Digital technologies and Music improvisation: Conferences, Workshops & Performances

2012-05-16T20:50:37Z

The ImproTech Paris - NYC 2012 workshop has organized a series of conferences, concerts, and performances from May 16th to 18th that explore the links between musical improvisation and digital technologies.

Gathering researchers and artists, it favors the idea of using digital intelligence as a source of continuous and sophisticated creation, in a complex interaction with live musicians, as opposed to mere decorative digital effects.

Distributed over 3 sites (Roulette, NYU, Columbia University) the event combines concerts, presentations, demos, and workshops and features such great artists as Roscoe Mitchell, Steve Coleman, George Lewis, Geri Allen, Bernard Lubat, Margaret Lancaster, Steve Lehman, Vijay Iyer, Mari Kimura, Esther Lamneck, Raphael Imbert, Lori Freedman, Brice Martin, Laurent Mariusse, Sylvain Roux, Les Emeudroïdes and many others.

May 16th: Concert at Roulette, 8:30 pm
May 17th: NYU (Steinhardt) lectures/demo/performances, 9:30-6pm
May 18th: Columbia (Prentis Hall) lectures/demo/performances, 9:30-6pm
May 18th: Columbia (Prentis Hall) Concert, 8pm

For more information, click here

INTERVIEW: Chantal Bilodeau and Lucie Tiberghien on Kwahulé's “That Old Black Magic”

2012-05-16T20:17:33Z

On March 19th 2012, New York Theater Workshop presented a staging of the play ‘That Old Black Magic' by the French-African playwright Koffi Kwahulé. At the event, French Culture interviewed Chantal Bilodeau, a frequent translator of Koffi Kwahulé's plays, and Lucie Tiberghien, director of That Old Black Magic.

Chantal Bilodeau

French Culture: How did you first discover Koffi's plays and begin working with him?

Chantal Bilodeau: I discovered Koffi about 10 years ago. I was interested in translating African playwrights into English because those voices were not being heard in the U.S. at that time (and sadly, that hasn't changed much). I had just moved to New York and didn't know a lot of people. But I had gotten involved with the Lark Play Development Center and when I talked to them about translating African playwrights, they encouraged me to pursue the idea. So I started trolling the Internet in search of potential plays to translate. I was able to get in touch with a few African playwrights who sent me their plays and recommended other African playwrights. Eventually, that's how I got to Koffi. I think he sent me three or four plays and when I read them, I knew immediately that I wanted to translate him. I then went back to the Lark and together we designed a translation residency (the first of many) where we invited Koffi to New York to work with me on his plays ‘Jaz' and ‘Big Shoot'. As it turns out, not only did I like the plays but I also got on very well with the playwright. So two translations turned into seven translations and here we are, ten years later and we're still working together.

FC: As a native of Quebec, you have experience of living between two languages and two cultures. Does that contribute to your interest in a “Francophone” writer such as Koffi?

CB: Yes. Because I live between two cultures and two languages, and entertain a love affair with both, I feel compelled to want to introduce my two lovers to each other; that's why I do translation. I long for both sides to see and understand what I love and admire in the other. Also, perhaps because I come from a minority culture—French-Canadians representing slightly less than 20% of the population of Canada—I naturally gravitate towards writers who deal with issues of identity and independence, and for whom language is not a given.

FC: What is it in Koffi Kwahulé's writing that appeals to an American audience?

CB: Koffi is known for his jazz aesthetic. From the construction of his plays and characters (or perhaps I should call them "voices" because they are not characters in the sense we usually understand them), to the musicality of his dialogue, his work is always in dialogue with jazz—that most quintessentially American art form. So at least formally, his work is always in dialogue with America. Most of Koffi's plays are also reflections on, or explorations of, the concept of identity—how it is defined, who defines it and what the consequences of having one's identity stolen or subjugated are. This is also a jazz theme—jazz's very origins take us back to the African slaves who created this music to celebrate and express identities that were otherwise being violently repressed. So formally as much as thematically, Koffi's work is very much engaged with American history and culture. In fact, several of his plays make direct references to America: ‘That Old Black Magic' takes place in New York, ‘Big Shoo' has a monologue about the seductive nature of New York, ‘Misterioso-911' reflects on 9/11, one of the characters in ‘Bintou' is obsessed with Brian DePalma's Scarface.

FC: What limits (cultural or linguistic) do you experience when translating Koffi's plays? (In ‘Big Shoot' for example, Stan's hobby in your translation is French.)

CB: I don't know that I would talk about limits but I would say that every play presents challenges that require creative solutions. In ‘Bintou', for example, the teenagers use a language that suggests slang. In the English translation, since it is impossible to use slang (which is inherently local) without immediately setting the play in a specific location, I had to make a choice. In the French version, although it is never said, the characters are clearly from a European country. To keep that European flavor in English, I tried to give the teenagers a language that has the rhythm and flavor of American slang yet is not so specific as to locate the action of the play in an American City. Another challenge was trying to replicate a certain rhythmic pattern which is present in ‘Misterioso-119' and, to a lesser extent, in ‘Blue-S-cat'. In French the pattern appears every time the word "que" is used. In English, "que" can become "that," "because," or sometimes it is just not needed in the sentence. In order to make the pattern clear, I added indications in the text that tell the actors where the rhythmic break should happen. I also slightly shifted its location sometimes in order to align it more closely with the rhythm of English speech.

FC: In an interview, Koffi Kwahulé said: « En France, dans certains milieux, on me dit : ' Koffi, ce que tu fais, c'est très Américain. » Et aux Etats-Unis, on m'a dit une fois : ' Vous savez, ce qui nous plaît dans votre travail, c'est qu'il est très Européen. ' J'aime cette anecdote qui veut dire que ce que les gens ne reconnaissent pas, c'est ce qui est différent chez celui d'en face. »

"In France, some people tell me: ‘Koffi, what you do is very American.' In the United States I was once told: 'You know, what we like about your work is that it's very European.' I like this anecdote which says that what people don't recognize what is different about people."

What do you think Americans see as specifically European in Koffi's writing ? Conversely, what do you think the French see as specifically American in his work?

CB: I don't think I would have been able to answer this question when I first started working with Koffi. But now that I know him better, and have observed audiences on either side of the Atlantic encounter his work, I have a better idea of what resonates and what feels foreign. In the U.S., where the Anglo-Saxon tradition of the well-made play dominates the theatre landscape, plays which experiment with form and language tend to feel European. Since in a lot of Koffi's plays, the narrative is slim—there is just enough of it to provide a backbone onto which other elements can be built—we tend to perceive his work as having a European sensibility. At the same time, Koffi's writing has a certain velocity and a cinematic quality. Those features, which are influenced by American films and television, are usually associated with the U.S.

Lucie Tiberghien

FC: How did you get to know Koffi Kwahulé's work ?

Lucie Tiberghien: Through Chantal Bilodeau, the translator, and the Lark Play Development Center. The Lark Play Development Center has supported all Chantal's translations of Koffi Kwahulé. As a workshop was planned for That Old Black Magic, and as I was bilingual, they thought of me for the direction.

FC: Was it your first staging a Koffi Kwahulé play?

LT: Yes, but I had seen some former productions of his work, for example ‘Bintou'.

FC: As a French-American stage director, how did you approach the work of an Ivoirian playwright who writes in French?

LT: I am very sensitive to the fact that he has a foot in two cultures, just like me. I feel it is a thing I have in common with him. Also, I am very sensitive to the strength of his writing in French, its poetry, its power. I am also looking for French texts that can move Americans, and talk to them.

FC: Is that the reason why you agreed to stage ‘That Old Black Magic'?

LT: Yes, because that's the only play of Koffi Kwahulé which is clearly set in the United States, and which raises the issue of interracial conflicts in this country. The fact that it is an Ivoirian playwright, writing in French, who raises those issues, seemed interesting to me with regards to the French-American relations.

FC: Jazz music is a strong American reference in Kwahulé's work. In your production of “That Old Black Magic”, you used music that was not written into the script. How did the musical references in the text affect your choice and use of music?

LT: First we leaned upon what Koffi himself had said in his text, through stage directions and very precise musical references (quotations of jazz musicians' names such as Coltrane for instance). The goal for that staging was to explore both text and music, because this is how the text has been written. In the staging we introduced themes of the musicians who were quoted by Koffi. Also my brother, the composer, and I have already worked together on many productions. He leaned a lot upon Koffi's suggestions but also freely improvised from there.

FC: You also chose to cut certain sections of the play…

LT: We wanted to try to make the play a little bit more accessible to an American audience as we imagined it. The play seemed to us a little too long, too dense. Moreover, the public discussion which took place after the staging of ‘That Old Black Magic' confirmed our intuition. While the European spectators were thrilled by the staging we had proposed, the American ones were a little bit more critical about it: they found the play too metaphorical.

FC: Why do you think that was?

LT: I think it is due to a certain American theatrical tradition, very different from the one in Europe. In the wake of Tennessee Williams' plays for instance, American texts are much more realistic, psychological, with a clearly defined dramaturgy and story.

FC: Do you think this might prevent Koffi Kwahulé's texts from being produced in the United States?

LT: From that perspective it is difficult. That being said, it is not a disincentive for me in any way! I have an intimate and personal will to promote French and Francophone theatre in the United States.

Image: Koffi Kwahulé

Many thanks to Chantal Bilodeau and Lucie Tiberghien for their kind collaboration.

65th Cannes Film Festival

2012-05-15T20:54:09Z

The 65th Cannes Film Festival opens tomorrow with screenings of Wes Anderson's Moonrise Kingdom and Sacha Baron Cohen's The Dictator, along with dozens of glamorous parties, backroom business meetings, and celebrity photo-ops.

At this year's festival the US film industry is more prominent than ever, with six of the twenty-two films in competition for the Palm d'Or, Cannes' highest prize, including Lee Daniels' The Paperboy and Walter Salles' adaptation of Jack Kerouac's On The Road coming from the States. American producer Harvey Weinstein, who was just recently awarded France's Chevalier de la Legion d'honneur, has also already made his presence felt, acquiring Quartet starring Dustin Hoffman, Killing Me Softly with Brad Pitt, taking a big stake in The Sapphires, and debuting Moonrise Kingdom, a Weinstein production.

Several anticipated French films will also premier over the next few days including sci-fi flick Holy Motors, Rust and Bone by 2009 Cannes Jury winner Jacques Audiard, and Vous N'avez encore rien vu by legendary filmmaker Alain Resnais.

With more than seventy new films showing in and out of competition at Cannes this year, there are dozens more intriguing titles, including Michel Gondry's The We and I, Abbas Kiorastami's Like Someone in Love, and Michael Hanneke's French language Amour.

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Queer New York International Arts Festival (QNYI) June 7-16

2012-05-15T16:40:32Z

Queer New York International Arts Festival (QNYI) is a new festival of contemporary performance and visual art that explores and broadens the concept of “queer (in) art.” Co-curated by Zvonimir Dobrović, artistic director of Queer Zagreb and the Perforations Festival in Croatia, and art historian and curator André von Ah, the festival aims to dispel preconceived and stereotyped notions of “queer” and provide a platform for expanding the discourse about artistic practices. The festival features works by an exciting lineup of artists including David Wampach (France), Ricci/Forte (Italy), Tadasu Takamine (Japan), François Chaignaud & Cecilia Bengolea (France, Argentina), Marlene Monteiro Freitas (Cape Verde), Silvia Costa/Plumes dans la tête (Italy), Biljana Kosmogina (Serbia), Željko Zorica (Croatia), Igor Josifov (Macedonia), and the East Village Boys (U.S.). The festival is presented in partnership with The Abrons Arts Center—QNYI's hub—with additional events presented at The Invisible Dog Art Center and The Impossible Project.

QNYI will include a series of discussions and public programs organized by Andy Horwitz and Jeremy M. Barker of Culturebot.org, and OUT magazine's editor-in-chief Aaron Hicklin. Dates and locations for these events will be posted on QNYI's website: www.queerny.org. QNYI coincides with LaMaMa's presentation of queer art during its 50th anniversary season.

QNYI is presented with support from Trust for Mutual Understanding, CEC ArtsLink, Institut Français, Serbian Ministry of Culture, the City of Zagreb, and FUSED - French U.S. Exchange in Dance. Descriptions and a schedule of performances and events follow.

David Wampach (France) – Auto + Batterie Saturday and Sunday, June 9 and 10, at 8:00pm Abrons Art Center: Playhouse Tickets: $20 With these works, David Wampach exposes and exploits the relationship between dance and music that, according to the artist, too often gets left on automatic pilot. A strange and demanding performance, Auto plays with expectations as the choreographer moves around the space to the sound of dissonant music. The second piece, Batterie, is a duet between a dancer and a drummer that explores a series of relationships: the drummer and himself, the rhythm and the body. www.abronsartscenter.org www.davidwampach.eu

François Chaignaud & Cecilia Bengolea (France, Argentina) – Paquerette Performance Thursday and Friday, June 14 and 15, at 8:00pm Co-presented by Chez Bushwick, The Invisible Dog Art Center and Queer New York International Tickets: $10 (suggested donation) François Chaignaud and Cecilia Bengolea are young dancer-choreographers who have been working together since 2005. They have collaborated with some of the stars of the European dance scene such as Gilles Jobin, Mark Tomkins, Mathilde Monnier, and Boris Charmatz, among others. Their work Paquerette deals with penetration as a (choreo)graphic and dance moment. Moving beyond the idea of penetration as a form of interaction or source of sexual pleasure, the dance uses penetration to create a new set of restrictions and liberties imposed upon the body. http://www.theinvisibledog.org/

The Kid from Paris: Jean Brassard Sings Yves Montand

2012-05-15T16:39:43Z

In celebration of the show's 2012 Bistro Award for Outstanding Tribute. “The Kid From Paris” celebrates the life and music of the legendary star of stage and screen, Yves Montand.

One of France most enduring stars, Yves Montand was both a major pioneer and a pillar of the 20th century tradition French chansons. In Brassard's 80 minute tribute to the beloved Montand, he presents an eclectic array of French and English selections from Montand's remarkable 50 year reign, deftly lacing songs, theatrical vignettes and a first-rate narrative of the beloved French icon's life, loves, passions and politics. Co-written and directed by Brassard's partner David Krueger, “The Kid from Paris” informs, moves, seduces and celebrates on many levels.

Accompanied by John Bowen on keyboards and accordion, Scott Ritchie on bass and Ben Cliness on percussions, Brassard holds center stage, performing in both the original French and in English, featuring loving new translations by Brassard and Krueger.

A native Québécois, Brassard has lived in New York since 1982, where he continues to build his career on stage, television and film. He has performed on numerous Manhattan stages with artists such as Steve Ross, Karen Kohler, KT Sullivan, Micheline van Hautem, Bob Cuccioli and Natascia Diaz to name a few. Jean was nominated for a MAC Award as Best Male Vocalist Debut and also garnered a 2012 AGGIE Award, both for “The Kid from Paris.” This tribute has also been performed in Canada, France and Belgium.

Date: May 20th & 22nd, 2012
Time: 7:00 pm
Place: Triad Theater

Reviews:

Linda Amiel Burns from TheaterMania.com, “Yves Montand was a first-rate performer and so is Brassard… after seeing this charismatic showman, you will become a fan”

Elizabeth Alfors of Cabaret Scenes, Jean “reflected the grace and charisma of the sexy Italian from Marseille.”

Jacqueline Chambord, Artistic Director of Alliance Française: “The narrative thread is excellent, Jean's voice superb and without imitating him, his evoking of Montand is first rate.”

About Yves Montand:

Edith Piaf, Simone Signoret and America's own Marilyn Monroe were all influential in Montand's life, contributing to the life of a man who had far more than just melodious pipes and a highly charismatic presence to offer. Montand also had a significant impact in the realm of politics, both in his artistic choices and as a citizen. His trajectory was nothing short of spectacular. Always the flag-bearer of France's working-class, Montand was a humble man of passionate opinion whose great prize and inspiration is authentic joie de vivre. Mr. Brassard rolls up his sleeves to measure himself against a boy from Marseille who held fast to the reins of his dreams to become Yves Montand.

Lovers

2012-05-15T16:30:15Z

At the court of Louis XV, Sébastien, a handsome fifteen year old boy versed in the medicinal arts, meets the nobleman Balthazar de Créon. De Créon, struck by the boy's beauty and his talents as a healer, orders Sébastien to his manor a few months later so he can instruct him in the ways of the court, hoping thus to install him as Louis XV's surgeon.

Daniel Arsand's slim, sublime Lovers is many things: a song of love and an ode to sensual abandon; a richly imagined, atmospheric evocation of the French court; a fable about freedom and the heart's indifference to social and class barriers; a heartfelt cry against those who, poor of soul, refute the legitimacy of unconventional love. Above all, with its delectable prose, Lovers is itself a delight for the senses.

For Sébastien Faure, the experience of love is so profound, so complete and transformative that, in its wake, he will be left with an almost occult understanding of the world, a potent knowledge bequeathed to him by passion that will endure even when the object of his love is no more. Sébastien is fifteen years old and already versed in the medicinal properties of plants and herbs when he meets the young nobleman Balthazar de Créon, whose life he saves after the latter is thrown from a horse. De Créon, struck by the boy's beauty as much by his talents as a healer, orders Sébastien to his manor some months later so he can instruct him in the ways of the court, hoping thus to install him as Louis XV's surgeon. His motives, however, are clouded by his lust for Sébastien, and after a brief period of restraint Balthazar and Sébastien abandon themselves to their passions and imaginations. But it is 1749 and their affair scandalizes the French court, bringing the king's wrath down upon them. Balthazar is eventually presented with an ultimatum: repudiate Sébastien and live, or do not, and die.

Lovers
by Daniel Arsand, Howard Curtis (translator)
Europa Editions ISBN: 9781609450717
Pub. date: June 01 2012

Last Days of an Immortal

2012-05-15T16:28:37Z

In the distant future, Elijah is a member of the “Philosophical Police,” and must solve conflicts that arise out of ignorance of the Other. Two species are fighting a war with roots in a crime committed centuries ago, and Elijah must solve the crime and bring peace between their species, while also confronting his own immortality in a world where science provides access to eternal life. Serious, heavy duty science fiction, with shades of the film Gattaca and George Lucas' THX 1138.

Last Days of an Immortal
by Fabien Vehlmann, Gwen de Bonneval
Archaia Press
Summer 2012

Hits: Philosophy in the Jukebox

2012-05-15T16:27:30Z

Hits: Philosophy in the Jukebox is an extraordinary foray into what apple has convinced us is the soundtrack of our lives. How does music come to inhabit us, to possess and haunt us? In this book, Peter Szendy probes the ever-growing and ever more global phenomenon of the hit song. Hits is the culmination of years of singular attentiveness to the unheard, the unheard-of, and the overheard, as well as of listening as it occurs when one pays anything but attention.

Szendy takes us through our musical bodies, by way of members and instruments, playing and governing apparatuses, psychic and cinematic doublings, political and economic musings. The hit song, Szendy concludes, functions like a myth, a force of repetition that grows by force of repetition. In the repetition generated by the song's relation to itself, Szendy locates its production as a fetishized commodity, a self-producing structure, and a self-desiring machine. Like a Deleuzian machine, then, the hit song is a technology of the self, or better, a technology of rule, a bio-melo-technology. After reading this book, one can no longer avoid realizing that music is more thana soundtrack: It is the condition of our lives. We are all melomaniacs, Szendy tells us in his unique style of writing and of thought. We are melo-obsessive subjects, not so much driven to a frenzy by a music we hardly have time to listen to as governed and ruled by it.

Hits: Philosophy in the Jukebox
by Peter Szendy, Translated by Will Bishop
ISBN: 9780823234370
Fordham University Press

'Wakhan, An Other Afghanistan' at Milk Gallery

2012-05-15T16:05:11Z

"Wakhan, An Other Afghanistan" is a documentary art project, including photographic essays, mixed-media works, video installations, and a book. For more information, click here

Dates: May 18-22, 2012
Place: Milk Gallery, 450 West 15th Street, NY

FUSED Awards Grants to Fund Cultural Exchange Through Dance

2012-05-14T18:16:33Z

The French-U.S. Exchange in Dance (FUSED) has awarded grants supporting international residencies and performances of contemporary dance work by eight French and U.S. artists for the 2012-2013 season.

Established in 2004, FUSED promotes reciprocal exchange of French and U.S. dance artists and presenters through network building and grantmaking. FUSED is supported by the New England Foundation for the Arts through its National Dance Project, by the Cultural Services of the French Embassy in the United States, in partnership with French American Cultural Exchange (FACE), with lead funding from the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation and the Florence Gould Foundation.

FUSED grants for 2012-2013 were awarded to:

Presenter: Chez Bushwick, Brooklyn, NY
French Artist: François Chaignaud & Cecila Bengolea, Poitiers
Project:Residency 2012

Presenter: One the Boards, Seattle, WA
French Artist: Christian Rizzo, Paris
Project:Neo Fiction

Presenter: The Kitchen, New York, NY
French Artist: François Chaignaud & Cecila Bengolea, Poitiers
Project: Untitled

Presenter: Abrons Art Center - Henry Street Settlement, New York, NY
French Artist: David Wampach, Paris
Project: Auto

Presenter: American Dance Festival, Durham, NC
French Artist: La Maison / Nasser Martin-Gousset, Paris
Project: Le Visiteur

Presenter: Miami Light Project, Miami, FL
French Artist: Cie La Baraka / Abou Lagraa, Lyons
Project: NYA (Trusting in Life)

Presenter: Centre National de Danse Contemporaine (CNDC), Angers
US Artist: Trajal Harrell, New York, NY
Project: Legendary with a Twist

Presenter: C.C.N. de Franche-Comté, Belfort
US Artist: Kimberly Bartosik, Brooklyn, NY
Project: You are my Heat and Glare

Presenter: Centre de développement chorégraphique (CDC) - Les Hivernales
US Artist: Jonah Bokaer, Brooklyn, NY
Project: The Ulysses Syndrome

About the Partners

FACE (www.facecouncil.org), an American 501(c)(3) operating foundation, is based in New York and works in partnership with the Cultural Services of the French Embassy in the U. S. Setting a new precedent in cultural relations, FACE pools private and public resources to support innovative dialogue and exchange in the fields of contemporary visual arts, performing arts, music, film, and secondary and higher education between the French-speaking world and the United States. As a catalyst for creativity and the promotion of what is new and excellent on both sides of the Atlantic, FACE strives to develop mutual understanding and cooperation between French and American civil societies.

The Cultural Services of the French Embassy provides a platform and resources for cultural exchange between French and American artists, intellectuals, curators and arts professionals. It is dedicated to creating new models for international dialogue in the arts and education from French and American perspectives. Based in New York City, Washington D.C., and eight other cities in the US, the Cultural Services' principal fields of action are the arts, literature, cinema, French language programs and higher education.

The National Dance Project is a program of the New England Foundation for the Arts (www.nefa.org). NEFA creatively supports the movement of people, ideas, and resources in the arts within New England and beyond, makes vital connections between artists and communities, and builds the strength, knowledge, and leadership of the region's creative sector. NEFA is a nonprofit that operates with funding from the National Endowment for the Arts, the New England state arts agencies, and from corporations, foundations and individuals.