Ten years after her first visit to Montreal, Angélica Liddell returns to us to present Liebestodhosted its North American premiere by Usine C. The striking Spanish artist made a strong impression during her visit to the 2014 TransAmériques Festival, with All the sky above the earth (El Síndrome de Wendy). An “eminently subversive” show, where the performer captivated her audience, as colleague Christian Saint-Pierre wrote at the time. The creator and actress agreed to answer our questions by email, after translation into her language.
Inaugurated at the 2021 Avignon Festival, this work – which will be surtitled – is part of the “Histoire(s) du théâtre” series, launched by Swiss director Milo Rau. Invited to create a chapter, Angélica Liddell therefore questioned her own history of theater. And she believes that this “represents blood, in every sense of the word; the visible and the invisible, in a mythical and tragic perspective. If the essence of my theater is ritual and transfiguration, I found in bullfighting and in the character of Iseult what gave meaning to the triad of love, beauty and death. A triad that dominates my conception of theater.”
Meaning “death of love”, the term Liebestod is borrowed from the final aria of the opera Tristan and Isolde by Richard Wagner. The show evokes the figure, legendary in Spain, of the bullfighter Juan Belmonte (1892-1962), who is said to have revolutionized bullfighting, he who was notably the first to wait, in an immobile posture, for the bull’s charge.
“Belmonte is the father of spiritual bullfighting,” writes Liddell. He is a mystical figure who helps me reclaim spirituality in art, which has been lost in favor of pragmatism and democratic responsibilities. » In this creation, she therefore brings to the stage “a defense of art, of the spiritual world in the face of the mediocrity of existence. I defend the union between art and life. Belmonte says we treat as we are, and we treat as we like. »
The artist draws a parallel between the act of creating and bullfighting, i.e. the practice of bullfighting. “In a way, I feel envy for the bullfighters, for this face-to-face confrontation with death, with the black beast; that is to say with themselves, she explains. I work with the desire for this danger and the way bullfighting transforms it into beauty. On stage, danger manifests itself through the intimate, in the exposure of intimate suffering [en public]. We work with the desire to die, but the angel appears and saves us, as in the sacrifice of Isaac. »
Among the creative sources of this tragic work, summoning the absolute, where death becomes the culmination of loving passion, we also include the legendary painter Francis Bacon, a “great fan” of bullfighting. His paintings inspire Angélica Liddell because the British artist “disembodies the human soul, dismembers it. He said that his painting represented realism in decomposition, violence.” Liebestod is also subtitled “the smell of blood does not leave my eyes”, a sentence that Bacon wrote after reading a Greek tragedy. “And it’s obviously a statement of aesthetic intentions about how violence is transformed into something beautiful.” »
If Liebestod carries a very personal component, the show will give Montrealers the opportunity to participate in two of her stage scenes, to share these short scenes with Liddell herself. The theater has in fact launched a call for extras – including fathers with their babies. A reference to a real anecdote: Juan Belmonte was so popular that several men asked him to baptize their babies…
Strong images
Over the past three decades, the author and director has created around twenty plays. To create, Angélica Liddell says she needs a “strong cause”, coming from her experience, from her injuries. “It is at this moment that words are born, and what follows is a chaos of images that I must put in order, even in my dreams. »
His theater is not short of powerful, striking, even provocative images. Usine C also warns that scenes “may offend the sensibilities” of certain spectators. What relationship does this entire artist, whose works have the reputation of being polarizing, maintain with the public in her creative approach? “I do theater in search of love,” she answers. I do theater so that the public hates the same things that I hate. This is where my strength comes from. »
We therefore ask her if she considers that art is too sanitized today, that artists are afraid of shocking? “There is a fear of not being accepted, because social networks have favored egotism and the search for consensus, a false idea of community. It is the culture of like, a society based on the collectivization of behaviors aimed at pleasing the group. Conversely, I defend the irreducible individuality of art, free and irresponsible. Most contemporary works reflect the world as we would like it to be, while I reflect the world with all its rottenness, including mine,” concludes Angélica Liddell. You have been warned.