For more than two decades, Frenchman Kader Attou has been one of the main movers behind the drive to take hip-hop from big city sidewalks to the stage, combining a constantly evolving urban dance form with contemporary dance, Indian kathak, martial arts movements and circus acrobatics.
Attou has said he became infatuated with hiphop as a teenager by watching a French television show, H.I.P. H.O.P. and trying to replicate the moves he saw on the screen. In 1989, he joined forces with Eric Mezino, Chaouki Said and Mourad Merzouki to found the dance collective Compagnie Accrorap.
It is interesting that he and Merzouki, both Frenchmen of Algerian descent, have become two of the most prominent proponents of the dance form in France and elsewhere in Europe. Both men have since become part of France’s dance establishment, Attou being named director of the Centre Choregraphique National in La Rochelle and Poitou-Charentes in September 2008, while Merzouki — who established his own company, Kafig, in 1996 — was appointed director of the Centre Choregraphique de Creteil et du Val de Marne in June 2009.
Photo courtesy of Julien Chavet
Attou and Accrorap are in Taipei this week for two shows of his 2013 production, The Roots at the National Sun Yat-sen Memorial Hall tomorrow and Saturday night, having spent the past few weeks touring Hong Kong, Beijing, Shanghai and Guangzhou.
The hour-and-a-half show, set on 11 male dancers, is both a retrospective of hiphop history and foreshadowing of the genre’s future, as Attou examines the boundaries and links between hiphop and contemporary dance — having cited diverse luminaries as Germany’s Pina Bausch and France’s Odile Duboc — as major influences on his choreographic development, along with his international travels.
In some interviews he has described himself as a “dance smuggler” and bridge builder.
Photo courtesy of Joao Garcia
The Roots is billed as “a human adventure,” although the stage is set with the most ordinary of human accessories: tables, wooden chairs, armchairs, a sofa, floor lamps, a record player and a radio. However, what Accrorap’s 11 men get up to among those items truely is adventurous — and probably should come with a warning that the moves should not be attempted by viewers in their own homes.
Divided into chapters, the show gives each dancer a chance to show his individual talents, while emphasizing the group’s dynamics.
Attou said music is a crucial element in the show, as melodies not only open the door to memories, but to mankind’s dancing. The score for the show, created by Regis Baillet-Diaphane, defies categorization, including everything from pieces from the classical canon to electronic music.
Photo courtesy of Joao Garcia
Photo courtesy of G. Perez
Photo courtesy of Julien Chavet
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