Tag: The Route to Rosa

Canada
https://www.fondation-langlois.org/html/e/page.php?NumPage=326

Alain-Martin Richard is a performer, artist, editor, and critic. Over the years he has developed a multidisciplinary practice that considers questions of art in society, and of art as poetic action—and as a philosophy enacted. His production has focused on the objective conditions of artistic experimentation, incorporating practices not usually associated with the field of art, the use of unaltered, everyday materials, and the use of ordinary technologies. He has participated in many festival and events, performing in North America, Europe and Japan. His performances focus on space, movement, pacing, identity and individual responsibility in a world marked by postmodernism and the vulgarization of all aspects of society. Currently, Richard’s most important field of investigation is into the concept of the “manœuvre”. He created the global manœuvre “Atopie textual” with the group “les Causes perdues”.

Richard has organized events including Marathon d’écriture in 1983, NeoSon(g) Cabaret in 1984, Symposium d’Amos in 1997, and Symposium de Moncton in 1999. He is co-editor with Clive Robertson of the book Performance in/au Canada 1970-1990, and he has also edited catalogues including Territoires nomades (1996) and 3e Symposium en arts visuels de l’Abitibi-Témiscamingue (1998). He has been a member the collective INTER/Le Lieu in Quebec City, as well as of the now defunct group The Nomads, an international collective involved with major events such as Documenta and the Olympic games. He is a member of the Quebec collective Folie/Culture.

FADO and DeLeon White Gallery invite Toronto audiences to The Route to Rosa, an interactive media installation by Quebecois artist Alain-Martin Richard. The installation, which includes four simultaneous video projections, features a combination of live video and prerecorded footage collected during an urban “manœuvre” (conducted under the working title Étrangers) conducted by Richard in Toronto in January and February of 2006.

The Route to Rosa is a subjective and ever-changing portrait of the city. The installation offers a meditation on the question of how Richard, as a “stranger” to Toronto, was able encounter its ethnically diverse inhabitants during a one-month residency, using people’s hands as a starting point.

The Route to Rosa is the third project in FADO’s Canadian Performance Art Legends series. This multi-faceted series celebrates Canada’s senior performance artists through the commission of major new works.

CALL FOR PARTICIPANTS

Étrangers is an urban “manoeuvre” being undertaken in the neighborhoods of Toronto as a form of research into the “other”. Regardless of religion, language, or nationality, there is one thing among others we all share: and this is “the hand”.

My work in the city will be to gather rough material, to seek out intimate contacts and to find a way to make it happen. I seek hands. If you live in Toronto, lend me your hands. Your hands may be black, white, or brown. They might be from here, or from elsewhere. This project seeks a method of recognition, a rapport stripped down to what we share.

It will take only a few moments of your time. I have only one question I would like you to answer on videotape. Starting with this collection of material and other footage taken in the city, I will present a multimedia installation here in Toronto at the beginning of June.

I am in residence in Toronto from January 10 to February 10, 2006.

ARTIST STATEMENT

Dans une certaine mesure, Rosa représente l’éternel féminin, cet attracteur puissant, mère ou amoureuse, la femme que l’on recherche sans doute toujours, la femme en nous.

The Route to Rosa parle du trajet de l’homme à travers la violence du monde, de cette Rosa tapie au fond de notre violence. Je comprends maintenant pourquoi les mains. C’est Mirabeau qui dit: «Les mains, c’est pour caresser ma fille, c’est par mes mains qu’elle appréhende le monde… et par la voix». Ce que la majorité des gens diront, chacun à sa manière. Propos banal, bien sûr, évidence, et cependant essentielle. Peu importent les ethnies, les religions, les langues, la main c’est la route vers Rosa.

Strangers, étrangers, Fremde, manœuvre urbaine dans le Toronto ethnique, s’est transformée en cours de route en un séjour dans le paysage humain, en un lent dialogue avec des étrangers. N’en suis-je pas un moi aussi? Ils m’ont invité chez eux, ils m’ont montré leur cuisine, leur salon, leurs enfants, leur crainte, leur désir, ils m’ont parlé de leurs mains, de caresses, de sexe, de travail, de création. Le prétexte était bon pour tromper nos solitudes.

J’ai entrepris ce projet avec l’intention de me rendre chez ceux que je crains: musulman terroriste, sikh sanguinaire, noir assassin, autochtone warrior. Se peut-il que nous ne soyons qu’une image de violence, que notre existence relative passe forcément par la souffrance, par la guerre infinie?

J’ai fait des appels à tous, je ne me suis pas imposé, je n’ai pas forcé la note. La majorité des réponses et des invitations était le fait de femmes. Autant de Rosa séductrices, amicales, sensuelles, douces, amantes, sévères, craintives, autant de femmes pour s’abolir soi-même dans le désir, dans l’incapacité de les absorber toutes pour une relecture du monde. Autant de rencontres pour tomber en amour.

Et aussi la même tendresse, la même retenue chez les hommes. Je n’ai pas rencontré de musulman terroriste, mais une Égyptienne qui éprouve dans son corps l’anéantissement des prisonniers de guerre, une Israélienne qui porte à l’écran l’inconcevable situation palestinienne. Pas de noir assassin, mais un Jamaïcain qui fait chanter la musique du monde dans la cité, pas de warrior, mais un Cri qui explore la matière douteuse de nos consensus. Et pourtant je les sais là, tout près de moi. Je les sais troués de balles sur les rues de mon quartier, je le sais s’explosant comme des machines détraquées, je le sais dévorés par l’alcool et les drogues létales.

Je n’ai pas affronté la fureur. Elle était cependant souvent perceptible. On trouve l’humanité là où elle se manifeste. Bien sûr nous ne sommes pas en Irak. J’ai diffusé mon projet, mes intentions à travers les multiples canaux de la ville. Cinquante personnes ont répondu. Cinquante fois j’ai quitté ma maison, j’ai fait le trajet vers un inconnu. Cinquante fois on m’a fait entrer ; invité à l’intérieur, j’ai apprivoisé l’étrangeté. Cinquante fois, j’ai frôlé l’intime, cinquante fois j’ai posé la question: “What is the most important use of your bands?”

Voici leurs réponses.

Je tiens à remercier pour leur généreuse et émouvante rencontre: Debra Alexander, Warren Arcan, Janet Attard, Lakshmi Aysola, Robert Bailey, Abdel Bassit, Martine Becquet, Lo Bil, Diane Borsato, Oscar A Calle, Michele Clarke, Paul Couillard, Linda Duvall, Lisa Fitzggibbons, Irma Gagnon, Hassan Haj, Martin Heath, Johanna Householder, Kole Kilibarda, Emily Kulasa, Betty-Jane Landry, Serena Lee, Alvaro Lopez, Diana Lopez Soto, Bernice Lyons Page, Nahed Mansour, Tanya Mars, Danielle Massie, Kiisti Matsuo, Ian McRonald, Amish Morrell, Fabian Orozco, Andrew James Paterson, Angelo Pedari, Diane Pugen, Sandy Ramon, Heike Raschl McRonald, Hanna Raschl McRonald, Mirabeau Richard-Ferrante, Elio Riggilo, Abraham Rios, Catherine Rodriguez, Mandip Singh Neil, Lisa Deanne Smith, Tonik, Annalise Walmer, Durmot Williams, Claudia Wittmann, bh yael, Damien Zielinski.

Alain-Martin Richard:
Performances, manœuvres et autres hypothèses de disparition
Performances, Manoeuvres and other Hypotheses for Disappearing

Edited by Paul Couillard and Alexandra Liva
Published by FADO Performance Inc., Sagamie édition d’art, Les Causes perdues

ISBN 978-0-9730883-3-5 (FADO)
ISBN 978-2-923612-38-6 (SAGAMIE)

414 pp, with index
Including DVD documentation of The Route To Rose (2006)

Dive into the unique creative journey of artist Alain-Martin Richard with the launch of an impressive new bilingual monograph. In this book, authors Paul Couillard, Doyon/Demers, Hélène La Roche, Paul Ouellet, Nicolas Reeves, Clive Robertson, Guy Sioui Durand and Marianne Trudel join Alain-Martin Richard to provide a comprehensive picture of Richard’s career and practice, from his theatrical experiments of the 1970s to his global “manoeuvres” in the 2000s.

Alain-Martin Richard lives and works in Québec. As an artist, he has presented manoeuvre and performance works in North America, Europe and Asia. He also works as a curator, critic and essayist, publishing articles in numerous journals on theatre, performance, installation and manoeuvre. He was a member of the former collectives Inter/Le Lieu and The Nomads, and remains active with Les Causes perdues in© and Folie/Culture. His works often deploy multiple planes of reality as in l’Atopie textuelle (2000) and The Route to Rosa (2006), the project presented by FADO in 2006 that initiated the publication of this monography.

Since 2000, FADO has been celebrating Canada’s senior performance artists with this multi-faceted series. Featured artists are asked to create a major new work, which is followed by a (text and video) publication documenting the artist’s history in performance. The series was curated and edited by Paul Couillard.

Canadian Performance Art Legends has honoured:

Margaret Dragu
Cleaning and Loving It (performance, 2000)
La Dragu: The Living Art of Margaret Dragu (publication, 2002)

Tanya Mars
Tyranny of Bliss (performance, 2004)
From Ironic to Iconic: The Performance Work of Tanya Mars (publication, 2009)

Alain-Martin Richard
The Route to Rosa (performance, 2006)
Alain-Martin Richard: Performances, Manoeuvres and Other Hypotheses for Disappearing (publication, 2014)