Les Indes Galantes
Clément Cogitore Les Indes Galantes Morgestraich Elegies
RAN Focus / Video screening
Information
《Les Indes Galantes》
1. 10/31(Sat) 17:20 - 17:27
2. 10/31(Sat) 19:50 - 19:57
3. 10/31(Sat) 23:00 - 23:07
《Morgestraich》《Elegies》
4. 11/1(Sun) 0:00 - 0:10
Roppongi Hills Arena
Free
Detail
Clément Cogitore adapted a scene from Les Indes galantes—an opéra-ballet composed by Jean-Philippe Rameau in 1735—featuring Krump dancers. Krump is a dance style that originated in the ghettos of Los Angeles in the 1990s. By combining the intense physicality of Krump with Baroque music, he offers a contemporary reinterpretation of Rameau’s work.
In this work, Cogitore pays homage to the Basel Carnival, in which he participated during his childhood. At 4:00, as the city lights go down, musicians march through the crowds to the sound of fifes and drums. By detaching this procession—which marks the transition from winter to spring, from death to life—from its specific time and space, Cogitore re-examines an ancient ritual that binds a community together in uncertain times.
Hundreds of small, glowing screens float above a sea of people; concertgoers are using their mobile phones to capture the scene unfolding beyond the confines of those screens. Like the subtitles of an absent song—or the inner voice of a disembodied narrator—passages from Rainer Maria Rilke’s Duino Elegies are etched into this massive, collective wave of energy, evoking a digital ritual.
Map
Artist
Clément Cogitore
Born in Colmar in 1983, and now based in Paris and Berlin. After studying at Le Fresnoy – Studio National des Arts Contemporains in France, Cogitore developed an artistic practice that lies at the intersection of contemporary art and cinema. Blending film, video, installation, and photography, he explores the forms of symbiosis between human beings and the images or representations they create. His work is driven by a distinctive perspective on ritual, collective memory, the embodiment of the sacred, and the permeability between different worlds. His works have been screened and exhibited at institutions such as the Palais de Tokyo, Museo Madre (Naples), Centre Pompidou (Paris), ICA (London), Haus der Kulturen der Welt (Berlin), MACRO (Rome), MoMA (New York), Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, Musée national des beaux-arts du Québec, SeMA Bunker (Seoul), Red Brick Art Museum (Beijing), and Kunsthaus Baselland (Basel), as well as at international events including the Lyon Biennale, Berlin Biennale, and Yokohama Triennale.
