NATIONAL PREMIERE
Technology to reshape the body, envelop it, project it into other dimensions. An evening featuring two distinct works by artists from different backgrounds, working together in harmony with digital media and its boundless possibilities. Hiroaki Umeda, a globally renowned and voracious Japanese performer active in France, regularly immerses his body in a storm of lights, sounds, and technology. Since founding his company S20 in 2000, he has been creating truly unique multidisciplinary performances. The layering of elements is so intricate that his body on stage becomes one with the electronic music, noise peaks, and technological bombardment. Umeda dances the fusion of knowledge, blending movements from hip hop to modern dance, dissolving the boundary between himself and the surrounding landscape as the performance evolves. This is also evident in Intensional Particle, a solo show where a trembling horizontal line projected on a screen gradually develops into a complex design of multiple lines that radiate energy and vibrations outward. Like particles in space emitting intentional force, Umeda’s body becomes a resonant vibration that reaches the audience.
Finnish artist Johanna Nuutinen, with a distinguished career in the Finnish National Ballet, creates performances where technology and video serve to express an intensely personal inner journey. In her solo Hatched, she explores themes of identity and anonymity, semi-nude and immersed in digital projections. Embarking on a visceral journey reminiscent of birth rites, she stirs deep emotions and awakens new questions in the viewer. Hatched represents the initial steps toward self-definition, the early steps of determining one’s identity.
hiroakiumeda.com
