A deeply emotive solo performance and UK premiere from Ivory Coast choreographer Nadia Beugré.
In ‘Quartiers Libres’, roughly translated as “free reign”, Beugré takes over the stage with breathless, raw energy, startling in its immediacy and unnerving imagery. In a fight with a world willing to bury her, piles of empty plastic bottles and Nadia’s body start to amalgamate, merge, and melt. By blurring the lines between the performer and audience, Nadia transcends the stage, tangled in endless microphone cable, and surrounded by mountains of waste. Becoming trapped within herself and her surroundings, she struggles to reach out to the humanity around her.
A mountain of empty plastic bottles, a powerful performer who sings and dances, the audience on stage: the ingredients of a high-voltage performance.
“Ms. Beugré knows how to make a crowd trust her just as, in a split second, she knows how to knock the air out of people. She’s wild, like the wind.” – New York Times
The Quartiers Libres Team
Choreography, performance, plastic creation Nadia Beugré
Dramaturgy, sound creation and operation Boris Hennion
Costumes Nadia Beugré and Boris Hennion
Light Design Laurent Bourgeois and Erik Houllier
Lights technician & stage manager Beatriz Kaysel
Assistant Daouda Keita
Sound Landscape « alarms » Mathieu Grenier
Executive production Libr’Arts / Virginie Dupray
Special thanks: Choreographic National Center in Montpellier (France), Agora-Montpellier Danse, Choreographic Development Center in Toulouse (France)
Transform Team
Creative Director Amy Letman
Producer Ali Ford
Producer (Creative People) Lily Lavorato
Assistant Producer Jay Millard
Trainee Producer Patrick McGeady
Company Administrator Rosie Hay
Production Manager Hannah Blamire
Project Manager Tshayi Hercules
Marketing & Communications Jack Lynch & Suzanne Wynne
Press Bread and Butter PR
Design Rabbit Hole
NADIA BEUGRÉ BIOGRAPHY
France-based Nadia Beugré began her career in a traditional dance theatre in the Ivory Coast. In 1997, she was one of the founders of the Tché Tché dance company, along with the multiple award-winning Béatrice Kombé. She studied at Germaine Acogny’s Ecole des Sables in Senegal, a training centre for traditional and contemporary dance techniques. Having conquered the French stage, she has opened herself up to the international dance scene. Her works Legacy (2015) and Tapis Rouge (2017) have been performed at major events including the Festival d’Automne in Paris and the Holland Festival in Amsterdam as well as in many other cities around the world. Nadia recently founded dance company Libr’Arts in Montpellier, a platform for production, touring and training between France and Ivory Coast.
TRANSFORM BIOGRAPHY
Transform is an engine room for powerful performance. We create exhilarating international festivals and work year-round to catalyse future-gazing artists and creatives to reimagine what theatre can be. Presented as an extended festival from Autumn 2021 to Spring 2022, Transform 21-22 will invite audiences from across Leeds and beyond to connect with bold, brave, vivid and socially-conscious performance by powerful artists from across the globe.
www.transformfestival.org
Twitter: @transform_leeds
Instagram: @transform_leeds
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