Clear, Loud, Bright, Forward
Paris, 2015
Benjamin Millepied, former artistic director of the Paris Opéra Ballet, invited United Visual Artists to collaborate on Clear, Loud, Bright, Forward an original work performed during his inaugural season in 2015.
The project began with a series of conversations and an exchange of stimuli and inspiration such as diagrams of Baroque choreography, dance formations and architecture from the same period. Having established Baroque as the common language, Millepied set up a dialogue between the creative disciplines of dance, architecture and music from which he and UVA could develop new and contemporary perspectives on each.
UVA’s approach interlinked and played with the architecture of the set, the ballet’s choreography and music. The intention was to create dynamic architecture that choreographs light and space and treats the space like a body, an entity that can move. By turning the stage into a spatial instrument, a place that can ‘dance’, architecture becomes a performer alongside the dancers themselves. In turn, the dancers choreograph the environment through their movements within it. The stage is articulated in different ways and various areas delineated by real or projected light controlled through programming.
Photographs by James Medcraft and United Visual Artists
