Radouan Mriziga: Atlas / The Mountain
Performance weaves together ritualistic movement, cultural traditions, and a visually rich stage language. The piece takes the audience on a journey where body, space, and memory become deeply intertwined.
Photo: Malek Abderrahman
About
In his latest solo performance, choreographer Radouan Mriziga takes us to the Atlas Mountains. In a ritual performance, he sheds light on the different layers of meaning surrounding the famous mountain. As a symbolic, romantic place in our imagination. As a difficult-to-access place and a refuge in times of war. As a door to heaven, as a connection to the Sacred.
Mriziga’s embodiment of a variety of polymorphic figures becomes a gateway: these half-human, half-animal creatures form mysterious, occult forces that lead us to the distant peaks of the Atlas. At the same time, they also reveal Mriziga’s investigation into the knowledge and practices of the Amazigh culture, in which his own roots lie. Various traditions, clothing, music, dances, and instruments are discussed while Mriziga follows the abstract stage lines that are now familiar from his practice, that refer to the geometry of Muslim architecture.
After the first part, which is about the mountains, this trilogy on the earthly elements continues with parts on the desert (Magec) and the sea (Awessu).
The performance is for adult audiences.
Artist
Choreographer and dancer Radouan Mriziga (Morocco, b. 1985) studied dance in Marrakech and Tunisia and continued his career at P.A.R.T.S. in Brussels, where he graduated in 2012. Since then, he has participated in several productions. From 2014, he began to create his own body of work, for which he received support until 2019 from Moussem Nomadic Arts Centre.
The sharing of different forms of knowledge is paramount in his practice, whether it is addresses space, architecture, or the body and its connection with mind and intellect. Or, more recently, knowledge about forgotten and repressed stories. In 2017, Radouan Mriziga became a resident at Kaaitheater in Brussels. In 2021, he became a resident artist at deSingel in Antwerp.
Credits
Choreographer and Performer: Radouan Mrziga
Coordination: Synda Jebali
Assistant: Mohamed Ridha Ben Khoud
Sound Creation: Zouheir Atbane
Costume: Salah Barka, avustajina Emna Bououn, Rim Abbes
Production: A7LA5 (Brussels) & L’Art Rue (Tunis)
Co-production: Festival d’Automne à Paris (Paris, France), Centre National de la Dance (Pantin, France), De Singel – International Arts Center (Antwerp, Belgium), Theater Freiburg (Freiburg, Germany)