assemblage

A solo dance by Christine Brunel

Intermezzo No 3
Music: Kunsu Shim

Hauch – Hände
Dance: Christine Brunel
Music: Antonio Vivaldi

Intermezzo No 4
Music: Kunsu Shim

Baum – Schritte
Dance: Christine Brunel

Intermezzo No 10
Music: Kunsu Shim

Lächeln – Boden
Dance: Christine Brune
Music: Gerhard Stäbler

Very little gives me a lot to see.
Very little to me is the name of abundance.

Christian Bobin from L’inspérée

assemblage is composed of several solos like a mosaic. Christine Brunel is consistently exploring pure movement. In its reduction and renunciation of everything spectacular, assemblage is intended as an answer to the zeitgeist and its fast-paced event culture. The dance relies on the echo it leaves in the viewer.

Part of the concept of assemblage is the consistent use of compositions by Kunsu Shim. His music and Christine Brunel's dancing seem to echo each other. Kunsu Shim was born in the harbour town of Pusan/South Korea. Through the ocean he experienced open spaces and wide horizons, characteristics which later found their way into his works. After studying composition in Seoul, Kunsu Shim moved to Germany, where he developed the basic reference points of his music, such as silence and simplicity. His music, performances and sound installations draw our attention to the sounds around us and direct our outer and inner ears and eyes to the often perceived poetic spheres of our everyday life.

The press wrote:

Westdeutsche Allgemeine Zeitung, 11 November 2003
Inspired by modesty and concentration
(...) The fragile dancer and choreographer played with time, stretching it, electrifying it, and she did this with the most reduced means. Christine Brunel managed to enthral her audience (...)

Her three dance pieces are marked by a renunciation of grand gestures, theatricality, speed and action. Brunel's dancing is a kind of withdrawal, but also so much more: it is full of individualism, expressiveness and tenderness. We see her in the first piece, entitled Hauch – Hände (Breath – Hands), crouched on the ground and hiding her face, filling the movements of her hands with a life of their own to music by Vivaldi. In the second piece, Baum – Schritte (Tree – Steps) we see a dancer taking measured steps full of tension and energy while changes from slow motion to faster tempos provide diversion. In the third piece, Lächeln – Boden (Smile – Ground) she dances to Karas.Krähen by Gerhard Stäbler. It's amazing how she brings out the essence of this music: she doesn't respond to the aggression in those pale sounds. Her tempo is different from that of the music. And yet she gets to the core of this work: its mysticism, its contemplative character. We see Brunel, with small gestures, a beautiful smile, and delicate gestures, writhing and rolling on the floor, stretching and apparently transcending it to almost float in an indeterminate space. The audience were entranced.

Neue Ruhr Zeitung, 17 November 2003
A world of rapture
(...) The Maschinenhaus is the right place for her. Her concentrated style of dancing unfolds in the 15 metre high hall with it walls of rough brick, its concrete floor, in the sparse room where the arches and seams of the brickwork still hold the atmosphere of a bygone age. The music of the South Korean Kunsu Shim can be seen as a leitmotif here. The low, scattered notes that lose themselves in the space and echo from the walls like delicate drops take the listeners to a pure, enraptured world. Christine Brunel's dancing follows the music very closely. Her almost slow-motion like tempo makes her merge completely with the here and now. (...) Christine Brunel knows how to take her audience's breath away with a minimum of means. Enthusiastic applause.

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Premiered on November 13th, 2003

Artistic Direction: Christine Brunel
Light Design: Reinhard Hubert
Costume Design: Sigrid Lachnitt (Lächeln and Boden), Christine Brunel
Assistance: Martina Candelo
Dramaturgy: Tonja Wiebracht

assemblage was produced by Tanztheater Christine Brunel

Partners:
Ministerium für Städtebau und Wohnen, Kultur und Sport des Landes NRW
Kulturbüro der Stadt Essen
Kunststiftung NRW

Special Thanks to:
Christa und Wolfgang Classen, Dr. Herbert Rickmann.