If we applaud his creations on stages around the world, we did not expect to find Mourad Merzouki and his Käfig company at the Musée d’Orsay on November 11 and 12. Hip-hop dancing in the temple of impressionism? The idea will certainly raise more than one eyebrow. But the dress rehearsal convinced us of the harmony of marriage.
Thus, we will find “unconscious” analogies, explains Merzouki, between his choreographies and the characters in the paintings and sculptures. The effect is particularly successful with Folia, given in the gold village hall where the public does not normally have access. We will then rush to the smoking room, another place that the public does not usually see, to applaud the solos and duets of Joel Luzolo and Aurélien Vaudey. The two dancers from the Käfig company have no equal when it comes to engaging the audience seated and standing around them. A little further in the Nabis room, four other dancers take flight in front of the master paintings.
Then, you have to pass in front of François Pompom’s polar bear to discover under the large nave another master work of the choreographer, Vertikal, a spectacular burst of dancers towards the sky. And that’s not all ! We will continue our stroll towards the large format room and then just next door, where like Mary Poppins, the dancers perform above the roofs of the Palais Garnier. In short, a hypermodern dance to revisit the atmosphere of the mythical Paris of the 19th century.