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Biographies SIDI LARBI CHERKAOUI Direction and Choreography Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui’s debut as a choreographer was in 1999 with Andrew Wale’s ‘contemporary musical’, Anonymous Society. Since then the Belgian-Moroccan choreographer has made more than 15 fully-fledged choreographic pieces and picked up a slew of awards, including the Fringe First award in Edinburgh, the special prize at the BITEF Festival in Belgrade, the promising choreographer prize at the Nijinsky Awards in Monte Carlo, the Movimentos award in Germany and the Helpmann award from Australia in 2007. In 2008 Sadler’s Wells named him an Associate Artist and in 2009 the Alfred Toëpfer Stiftung conferred its Kairos prize to him in recognition of his artistic philosophy and his quest for cultural dialogue. In 2008 and 2011 he was declared Choreographer of the Year by the dance magazine Tanz. While Cherkaoui’s initial pieces were made as a core member of the Belgian collective, Les Ballets C. de la B. – Rien de Rien (2000), Foi (2003) and Tempus Fugit (2004) – he also undertook parallel projects that both expanded and consolidated his artistic vision. Ook (2000) was born from a workshop for mentally disabled actors held by Theater Stap in Turnhout with choreographer Nienke Reehorst; D’avant (2002) from an encounter with longstanding artistic partner Damien Jalet, Juan Kruz Diaz de Garaio Esnaola and Luc Dunberry of Sasha Waltz & Guests company; and zero degrees (2005) with friend and choreographer Akram Khan. He has worked with a variety of theatres, opera houses and ballet companies, but from 2004–2009 Cherkaoui was based in Antwerp where he is an artist in residence at Toneelhuis, the theatre that produced Myth (2007) and Origine (2008). In 2008 Cherkaoui premiered Sutra at Sadler’s Wells. This award-winning collaboration with Antony Gormley and the Shaolin monks continues to tour the world to great critical acclaim. After his first commissioned piece in North America, Orbo Novo (for Cedar Lake Contemporary Ballet) and a series of duets such as Faun (which premiered at Sadler’s Wells as part of In the Spirit of Diaghilev) and Dunas with flamenco danseuse María Pagés (both in October 2009), he launched his new company Eastman, resident at deSingel International Arts Campus and Toneelhuis in Antwerp. Spring 2010 saw him reunited with co-choreographer Damien Jalet and Antony Gormley to make Babel(words), the third part of a triptych that began with Foi and Myth. That same year he created Rein, a duet featuring Guro Nagelhus Schia and Vebjørn Sundby, as well as Play, a duet with kuchipudi danseuse Shantala Shivalingappa and Bound, a duet for Shanell Winlock and Gregory Maqoma as part of Southern Bound Comfort. Babel(words) recently triumphed at the 2011 Laurence Olivier Awards, winning best new dance production and outstanding achievement in dance for Antony Gormley and also received a Benois de la danse at Bolshoi, Moscow. 2011 saw the creation of TeZukA, a new piece for 15 performers about the works of the master of Japanese manga, Osamu Tezuka. TeZuka has toured extensively since its creation. Cherkaoui also created Labyrinth for Dutch National Ballet the same year. In 2012 he worked on Automaton for the American dance company Pilobolus. For his own company he developed Puz/zle, premiering at the Festival d’Avignon in La Carrière de Boulbon. This old stone quarry inspired him to take stone as a defining element for the choreography. Together with eleven dancers, the Corsican men’s choir A Filetta, Lebanese singer Fadia Tomb El-Hage and Japanese musician Kazunari Abe he questioned the puzzles that lie behind human relationships. He has also collaborated with Joe Wright on his movie Anna Karenina, for which he helmed the choreography. ANTONY GORMLEY Visual creation and Design In a career spanning nearly 40 years, Antony Gormley has made sculpture that explores the relation of the human body to space at large, explicitly in large-scale installations like Another Place, Domain Field and Inside Australia, and implicitly in works such as Clearing, Breathing Room and Blind Light where the work becomes a frame through which the viewer becomes the viewed. By using his own existence as a test ground, Gormley’s work transforms a site of subjective experience into one of collective projection. Increasingly, the artist has taken his practice beyond the gallery, engaging the public in active participation, as in Clay and the Collective Body (Helsinki) and the acclaimed One & Other commission in London’s Trafalgar Square. Gormley’s work has been widely exhibited throughout the UK with solo shows at the Whitechapel, Serpentine, Tate, Hayward Gallery, British Museum and White Cube. His work has been exhibited internationally in one-man shows at museums including Louisiana Museum of Modern Art (Denmark), Malmö Konsthall (Sweden), Kunsthalle zu Kiel (Germany), Antiguo Colegio de San Ildefonso (Mexico City), Kunsthaus Bregenz (Austria), State Hermitage Museum (St Petersburg), Deichtorhallen (Hamburg) and Centro Cultural Banco do Brasil, São Paulo. Gormley has also participated in group shows at the Museum of Modern Art (New York), the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, the Venice Biennale and Documenta 8 (Kassel, Germany). Major public works include Angel of the North (Gateshead, England), Another Place (Crosby Beach, England) Exposure (Lelystad, The Netherlands). Gormley was awarded the Turner Prize in 1994, the South Bank Prize for Visual Art in 1999 and the Bernhard Heiliger Award for Sculpture in 2007. In 1997 he was made an Officer of the British Empire (OBE). He is an Honorary Fellow of the Royal Institute of British Architects, an honorary doctor of the University of Cambridge and a fellow of Trinity and Jesus Colleges, Cambridge. Gormley has been a Royal Academician since 2003 and a British Museum Trustee since 2007. SZYMON BRZÓSKA Composer and Piano Born in Poznań (Poland) in 1981, Szymon Brzóska already started playing piano at age seven. From 2000 until 2005 he studied at the Ignacy Jan Paderewski Music Academy in Poznań where he was taught composition by Mirosław Bukowski and from wich he graduated as a Master in Arts. In 2007 Szymon completed his postgraduate degree in composition at the Royal Flemish Conservatory in Antwerp (Belgium) under the guidance of composer Luc Van Hove. During his studies in Antwerp he was selected among the contestants in the competition for composition of the music @venture 2007 festival in Antwerp, which commissioned him to create a piece for the prestigious Belgian ensemble I Solisti del Vento. September 2009 saw the premiere of his concerto for piano, strings and percussion Hommage à Schnittke, played by pianist Barbara Drążkowska, during the 42nd edition of the Festival of Polish Piano Music in Słupsk. In may 2010 Drążkowska also performed the World Premiere of Septem – seven miniatures written especially for her at the Sounds New Contemporary Music Festival in Canterbury. Composer’s particular interest in the synergy between music and other arts, such as contemporary dance, theatre and cinema also caused him to participate in film soundtracks and theatre projects. Szymon composed the score for Sutra, a Sadler’s Wells’ production in London. This dance performance was made in collaboration with choreographer Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui, sculptor Antony Gormley and monks from the Shaolin temple in China. Sutra premiered in London in May 2008 before touring across the globe through 2008-2012. Brzóska also wrote the soundtrack for the French film Le bruit des gens autour, directed by Diastème, which was premiered at the Festival D’Avignon in 2008. After the success of Sutra, Szymon collaborated again with choreographer Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui by writing the score for Orbo Novo, a modern dance piece performed by the New York-based Cedar Lake Contemporary Ballet. Orbo Novo premiered at the Jacob’s Pillow dance festival in July 2009 before touring through the United States and Europe. His connection with modern dance continues when he composes a cello piece for I will, the solo by Małgorzata Dzierżon of Rambert Dance Company (premiere June 2009 in London) and by composing the score for Dunas, a duet between Cherkaoui and flamenco danseuse Maria Pagès. (Dunas premiered October 2009 in Singapore) A new collaboration with choreographer Joost Vrouenraets led to the premiere of (S)NOW in October 2010 in Tilburg, Netherlands. Szymon's orchestral score for Labyrinth, a full-length ballet commissioned by Het Nationale Ballet in Amsterdam and premiered in June 2011 in Het Muziektheater in Amsterdam, was another collaboration with Belgian choreographer Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui. November 2011 saw Szymon back in his home town, Poznań, for the premiere of his new score for Desert – a dance performance choreographed by Paulina Wycichowska (Polish Dance Theatre in Poznań). Casting Traces, a collaboration with New Movement Collective premiered in London in July 2012. Performance Oh, Noh, choreographed by Kaya Kołodziejczyk had its premiere in Warsaw in November 2012. Szymon’s music was performed live by Kinematic Ensemble. ALI THABET Assistant Choreographer and Performer Ali Thabet’s initiation into movement arts came through kung-fu. Despite a longstanding affinity with dance, he joined the National Centre for Circus Arts in Châlons (France) in 1997. He performed in Francis Viet's Furie (2001) but got his first major breakthrough in 2002 with Cyrk 13, a piece choreographed by Philippe Découflé with whom he has since collaborated on several other projects. He was part of Josef Nadj's Il n'y a plus de firmament (2003) where he got the opportunity to work with artistes like Jean Babilé and Ioshi Oïda. He met Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui in 2004 and joined the cast of Tempus Fugit as a performer, in 2008 he joined Sidi Larbi's Sutra as a assistant choreographer and performer. DAMIEN FOURNIER Assistant Choreographer and Performer Damien Fournier was born in 1977 in France where he is currently based. At the age of 13, he fell in love with the circus and immediately signed up at the regional circus school in Toulouse, where he trained for five years before moving on to the National Centre for Circus Arts in Châlons (France). There he crossed the ways of Mario Gonzales, Francis Viet, Pal Frenak and Pierre Doussaint who influenced his career. While at the CNAC he got drawn to the creative universe of artists like Guy Alloucherie and Josef Nadj. After an injury during the exit show of the Cnac, Slowly, he decided to dedicate himself to contemporary dance entirely and left the circus world behind him. This meant a mental change as well. He turned to something more introspective, intimate. After school, he worked with Alloucherie (Les sublimes), Giorgio Barberrio Corsetti (Paradiso, Argonauti), Kitsou Dubois (Traversées). With the latter he discovered the parabolic flight (zero gravity) which was an extremely inspiring experience. He worked with Josef Nadj (Il n’y a plus de firmament, Asobu) where he collabored with Mariko Aoyama, Yoshi Oîda and Jean Babilé. He discovered Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui in Iets op Bach by Alain Platel, which impacted him deeply. In 2006 he joined Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui on Myth. Damien Fournier is impassioned about widening the vocabulary of dance through sources as diverse as sign language and personal narratives. After Myth, he stayed involved with Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui and Eastman. He acted as assistant-choreographer and rehearsal director in Sutra, dances in Babel (words) and Puz/zle, participated in Anna Karenina, the movie of Joe Wright for which Cherkaoui helmed the choreography.