Damien Jalet modifies reality

hube: Let’s start with the long-distant past when dance was a part of ritual, back to the times when it was a message to the gods. How do you perceive the nature of dance in this context today? Does it have any connection to spirituality for you? And if it does, how would you describe it?

Damien Jalet: I think that in many places today, dance is still used as a direct way to connect to the divine. Even though dance in Western societies is no longer part of religious ceremonies (something that has been the case for a long time, as monotheistic religions are so afraid of the body—except for the more esoteric branches like Sufism), it remains a pretty mysterious and ungraspable medium. Maybe because it’s so ephemeral, because it’s nearly impossible to own, because you cannot really make a lot of money from it, it remains a relatively pure and direct form of expression. It also demands a lot of discipline, both physically and mentally. Most of all, it demands that you really connect to your intuition. Beckett said “Dance first, think after. It’s the natural order.” As a dancer or dance creator, you gain an incredible amount of knowledge through physical exploration and creativity by using your body and connecting to other bodies. I started dancing when everybody told me not to, but it felt like a call I could not leave unanswered—25 years later I can say that dance has been the greatest gift of my life. It is a very profound tool that allows me to explore the human condition and the world. It demands a nearly ascetic commitment, but it gives so much in return. 

h: Music is one of the highest forms of abstraction. It leaves the viewer alone with their inner world. When a dancer joins the music, a new narrative arises. However, dance is often dependent on music, maybe even subordinated by it. Are you confused by this relationship? Or perhaps you have a different perception of the connection between dance and music?

DJ: I don’t believe dance is dependent on music, dancing in silence is a very powerful thing that I have explored on many occasions. My relationship with music can change radically from one work to another. Sometimes I start with it and sometimes it’s the last element brought to the work. When I did Brise-lames (2020) for the Paris Opera, we worked with a metronome for four weeks while the composer Koki Nakano was tailoring his music in parallel to the work. I sometimes like to have only sounds to score my work. 

In Vessel (2016) with Marihiko Hara, we worked with sounds that can be barely perceived by human ears. Because the work also plays with visual perception. Through their interaction with the light, the bodies somehow create mirages, the meaning of which the audience then projects onto the dancers. I’m not usually so attracted to melodies in my work. I like to feel a kind of friction and enjoy live music that is layered. That’s why I often work with electronic acoustic musicians like Fennesz, Tim Hecker, Ryuichi Sakamoto, Marihiko Hara, and Ben Frost.

I actually started playing an instrument before I started dancing, Then I realised  I needed a more direct way of expressing myself, which brought me to theatre; but there I felt there was always a dependence on words and text, and I slowly drifted away from it and towards dance. At that time, I started to do a lot of singing as well. It was the music of oral traditions, often polyphonic, coming from Italy. I was studying ethnomusicology with Giovana Marini, an incredible woman who used to be very close to Pier Paolo Pasolini. Actually, she’s the one who taught me about rituals. That a ritual is always connected to a function. This music was so strong for me because you could harmonise different voices and fuse them into one—but with friction as well. It sometimes sounded extremely raw and visceral, but it also evoked a real connection to the divine. 

My first official creation as a choreographer was D’Avant (2002), a collective piece made at the Schaubühne in Berlin with four male dancers/singers, where we sang 12th century polyphonies a capella while dancing. No musicians and no amplification for nearly 80 minutes. The feeling when you left the stage was indescribable. Like being turned inside out like a sock. I have to say, having performed as a singer, dancer, and actor on specific and distinct occasions, that even though the act of performing [in every medium] demands you to go to the core of yourself, the feelings I experienced afterward are very different. 

h: Human plasticity is not limitless. Talent and training cannot overcome the force of gravity. As a professional dancer who always pushes for more and tries to break the barriers: how do you reconcile with such limits?

DJ: I discovered that dancers shouldn’t be trained to go to war with gravity, but to play with it. It’s very rewarding when you start doing it. Gravity is such a beautiful thing. It is magnetism, it binds, it creates worlds! Apparently, it’s nearly impossible to make love in a zero-gravity environment. And for me, the best dancers are those who have a playful and conscious relationship with gravity. Dancers being gravity defying is a boring and dated concept for me. I am much more interested in seeing the ecstasy of surrendering to it, a little bit like when you see people falling asleep on the train after a long day of work, suddenly physically abandoning themselves to it. 

This is why, for me, there is such a strong relation between gravity and the subconscious. It’s something that has inspired me tremendously throughout my career and I continue trying to collaborate with gravity to access images that explore our collective subconscious. 

Of course, I am not interested in seeing dancers motionless on the floor. We all have an antigravitational desire to rise, but I have always seen the denial of gravity that you find in ballet as a complete fraud, as a lie. I’m interested in finding a cosmic dance that connects to this force. 

h: In contemporary art, artistic statements are often considered as more important than craft. In dance, technical skills remain the most important basis for creativity. For example, in classical ballet, the dancer’s performance can make both the plot and the music disappear. How are technical skills and art connected in your practice?

DJ: I guess that’s why I don’t define myself as a ballet choreographer, but as a contemporary dance choreographer. Technical skills and physical potential are important, sometimes crucial, but I have also made dancers from people with no dance technique, like actors, musicians… and they were still able to convey something. I will never reduce dance to technical skills. There are some works I’ve done, like Vessel (2019), that are so anatomically precise that only certain dancers can perform them. 

Every creation starts with the seed of an idea that I try to let grow from a place that is not only rational, but at the intersection of where I am emotionally, intellectually, and physically—so again, from a place of intuition. As a choreographer I really try not to get stuck in a style, I don’t want to be confined by codes that I explored in previous works, even though I feel there is continuity and coherence in my choreographic exploration. I always develop a physical language that is truthful to the idea of departure. I guess that’s why I love collaborating with other artists, it always puts me in “the zone”, a place in between. 

The human capacity for adaptation is limitless, and that’s why I like to explore how ideas push the imagination to transform the body. The studio is always a place of revelation. A piece can never be purely rational, you can come with an idea, but working with dancers who you will confront your initial idea often  brings unexpected results. Sometimes an idea doesn’t take off, but if you remain aware, in the present, and alert, it can trigger a variation that will open a door to something you had not thought of, that you had not imagined. 

I guess creating is always the meeting point of the imagination and reality. As a choreographer, my reality is often other human beings that carry an infinite inner world within technical limits. The confrontation of their subjectivity against an initial idea, is an endless field of exploration. Making a work is about framing, capturing something subjectively meaningful within that ocean of possibilities.