les soeurs schmutt & friends

© David Wong 2018

INTÉRIEUR BRUT

CREDITS

Project initiated by Sonia Bustos

Choreography - Élodie Lombardo

Interpretation & creation - Sonia Bustos

Music - Robin Pineda Gould

Lighting design - Lucie Bazzo

Artistic advising - Séverine Lombardo

INTÉRIEUR BRUT — literally « Gross Domestic » or « Raw Inside »
A 40-minute dance solo initiated by Montreal-based, Mexican dancer Sonia Bustos and choreographed by Élodie Lombardo (co-artistic director of Cie Les Soeurs Schmutt), Intérieur Brut depicts a succession of physical states, spawned by stories of daily violence, as they wash over a woman’s body.
Inspired by recent sociopolitical events in Mexico as well as troubling realities that many women still face daily, Intérieur Brut raises awareness against the normalization of violence and abuse against women. In close proximity with the audience, this solo aims to deconstruct the implications of systemic violence.
How does one embody, retell or condemn such an event, through the evocative, poetic language of the moving body? How does one accept one’s accountability — whether it be artistic or civic — in the  face of injustice and abuse?

Stage setting
Intérieur Brut was intended to be shown in 2 specific contexts of exhibition :

• On-stage, with the public seated in a half-circle or in a classic, frontal disposition.

• In a Gallery setting, where the solo is performed within the framework of another artist’s work, offering a different vision and interpretation of both pieces.

In this fashion, the premiere of Intérieur Brut, in April 2018 at the gallery of the MAI — Montreal Arts Interculturels, was performed in the midst of a series of large-format photographic portraits by Mexican photographer Liliana Zaragoza Cano, selected from her project Mirada Sostenida. Mirada Sostenida brings to light the story of a number of women, victims of sexual abuse by police officers as they were arrested at a peaceful protest in San Salvador Atenco, in 2006.

Artistic Mediation
In both the on-stage and gallery formats, an artistic mediation activity is offered with the solo, presented by Nuria Carton de Grammont. An independent curator, Nuria is drawn to projects that promote interculturality in the arts and specializes in the geopolitical representations of contemporary Mexican art, memory and violence, most notably narcotrafficking. Nuria will guide the public through an exchange and reflexion on both artistic and social aspects brought to light by the solo and, if it was performed in relation to a visual or installation work, on the relationship between the two works.