En Atendant

Night falls

In En Atendant (2010), Anne Teresa De Keersmaeker was taking a new step in her exploration of the combination of music and dance. After Bach and Webern in Zeitung, The Beatles in The Song and Mahler in 3Abschied, this time her starting point was the Ars Subtilior: a complex form of polyphonic music from the 14th century that is based on dissonance and contrast. Ars Subtilior developed on the ruins of the plague and the Church at a time when the social, political and religious pillars of mediaeval society were fragmenting. Nowadays this upheaval seems more relevant than ever. In the light of today’s increasingly confusing events and the complexity of the choices we face, the question of our mortality and physicality is becoming ever more crucial.

In 2010 and 2011 Anne Teresa De Keersmaeker created two productions for the Avignon Festival: En Atendant and Cesena. Both were danced on the Cour d'Honneur at the medieval Papal Palace, where only natural lighting was used. In En Atendant evening passes into night, while Cesena is set at the crack of dawn.

Both performances were subsequently staged at La Monnaie in Brussels, but this season audiences can experience them in an 'authentic' re-enactment, using only the light of day in a setting that is equally magnificent and medieval: the ruins of the abbey at Villers-la-Ville. Villers-la-Ville is about 50 km from Brussels and is accessible by train: the station at Villers-la-Ville is on the Ottignies-Charleroi line, 2 km from the abbey.

Carpool to Villers-la-Ville, check this Facebook event page.