Spotted during the presentation of graduates of the Montreal Contemporary Dance School (EDCM), the piece My horoscope finds me ugly will come to life at Tangente from January 18 to 21. At the origin of this offbeat work is Mathieu Hérard, a 26-year-old young graduate from France. His sources of inspiration? The art of drag, the lip sync and the Internet.
“I never saw myself as a creator. I love dancing the words of another, it resonates with me a lot, being a performer, and in the training I have done, I have had little touch with creation,” explains Mathieu Hérard, who studied theater then in a double dance-theater program at the Strasbourg Conservatory before landing in Montreal, in 2018. “I mainly learned theoretically, how to occupy a stage space, create for groups, editing, scenography too, all the jobs around the stage, but I had not yet gotten my hands dirty as a choreographer,” adds the performer, who will be in five creations in 2024.
Once he obtained his diploma, Mathieu Hérard decided to propose a piece at Boomerang, a laboratory for EDCM students. “At that time, I was questioning whether to go into drag or not. A part of me would really like that, I like the side show and I love it lip sync, but I didn’t have enough time to devote to that. So I gathered everything I loved about drag and took it out of its world to bring it to the contemporary dance stages,” he says.
He quickly decided to surround himself with Raphaëlle Renucci, also a graduate of EDCM and performing for different companies, notably Sylvain Émard Danse, where the two artists became closer. “In the studio, I put my playlist, which is completely crazy, which goes from classical to rap via voices, jokes, etc., then, each in turn, we were going to move, see what it inspired us. Already in the studio, we were laughing! » says the choreographer.
I really love to laugh and I feel like we don’t laugh enough, not in an open way, on contemporary dance stages. We go to see comedies to laugh, comedians to laugh, funny plays, but where do they take me to dance if I want to laugh? Could a choreographer create a dance comedy?
Little by little, Mr. Hérard defines several paintings and characters. Subsequently, the two artists focus on gestural and scenic intentions. “We tried to vary the gestures, the rhythm, the occupation of space, etc., but I didn’t want to do movement for movement’s sake. I was thinking especially about energies, and then, we found body qualities, he explains. The important thing for me was that it remained “Raph and Math”, and not tricks. » For the creator, his role was then to add “makeup to the choreography”, in particular with facial intentions and the addition of “subliminal images”.
Body in absurdity
“My dances made people laugh a lot, especially during my training. People were very amused by my energy. My body wants to make people laugh,” says the artist. It was therefore quite natural that his first choreographic piece would incorporate humor. “I really love to laugh and I have the impression that we don’t laugh enough, not in an open way, on contemporary dance stages. We go to see comedies to laugh, comedians to laugh, funny plays, but where do they take me to dance if I want to laugh? Could a choreographer create a dance comedy? » asks the dancer.
Thus, in addition to music and dance, Mr. Hérard integrated several popular references. “There are references that come back every year: Mariah Carey for Christmas, extracts from Heart has its reasons…Passages from real life are blocked on the Internet, and I find that just as creepy how wonderful. We know them all, it brings us together, and, at the same time, we have frozen this moment in online history,” he explains. So, in My horoscope finds me uglywe also find political speeches, the horoscope, or even references to memes, also “lip sinqués”.
Mathieu Hérard, who would like to have this piece travel, particularly internationally, thinks that these various popular references are a force for creation. “All audio content could change depending on the event or country. The attack on the black turkey, for example, is not a reference in France, but the Parisian woman who talks about marriage for all, yes! » he says.
It’s only a few months after presenting for the very first time in front of an audience My horoscope finds me ugly, at the EDCM, that Mathieu Hérard was contacted to play it at Tangente, in January. An upheaval for the artist, who, without a subsidy, had no money to pay for studios, a residence for rehearsals and his interpreter. “I had a lighting plan in mind, then the desire to make a minifilm that would open the show. Plus, we needed to rehearse again with Raphaëlle, and time was too tight for me to ask for a grant,” he says. He then decided to launch a crowdfunding campaign, which reached its objective in just a few weeks.
“It’s a work which contains lots of popular references, which speaks to people a lot, so the fact that it is partly financed by the public, also by lots of people around us, that makes perfect sense! » he concludes.