In exploring the remnants of dance beyond the stage, the collaborative project Kono atari no dokoka (Somewhere around here) navigates the artistic relationships of Japanese-Austrian performance-maker Michikazu Matsune, French choreographer Martine Pisani, and Dutch painter-performer Theo Kooijman. Focusing on their activities from the 1980s and 1990s, this venture examines the interplay between archives, personal memories, shared anecdotes, and imaginations.
Martine Pisani’s poetic and humor-infused body of work, initiated in the mid-1980s, intertwines movements, words, and performative acts. Michikazu Matsune, blending documentarist and conceptualist approaches, collaborates on this project, recording the trio’s shared history. Theo Kooijman, Pisani’s real-life partner and longtime performer, reimagines her early works for the project.
The fictional setting of Kono atari no dokoka brings the spectator to Japan, inviting reflection on local and global contexts and histories. The performance weaves together anecdotes from the trio: Pisani’s encounters with choreographer Odile Duboc, Kooijman’s arrival in Paris and fascination with tango, and Matsune’s youth in Kobe and subsequent move to Europe. Pisani’s life took a dramatic turn during this period due to an illness, adding another layer to the collective memory.
From Kobe to Marseille, Paris to Vienna, the performance constructs a composite present from personal stories, blending simplicity, poetry, humor, and tenderness. Kono atari no dokoka becomes a journey through time and space, revealing a shared history that lingers in the gaps and universality between continents, generations, and individual narratives.
http://www.michikazumatsune.info
http://www.ciemartinepisani.fr
Reviews
“I had to cry at the end of the documentary performance Kono atari no dokoka (Quelque part par ici – Somewhere about here), when French choreographer Martine Pisani spoke her lines.” – Fransien van der Putt in Theaterkrant.
Read the full review here.
