MOUVOIR – École des Sables, Stephanie Thiersch & Alesandra Seutin

To begin again

Isn’t to go backwards

But to decide to go on.

(Amanda Gorman)

Beneath the canvas of global rhythms, UNTIL THE BEGINNINGS orchestrates a vibrant dance-poem that brings together an international team of eight dancers from Senegal, Germany and France along with musicians from the field of percussion and rap.
The directors Alesandra Seutin (Artistic Director École des Sables, Senegal) and Stephanie Thiersch (Artistic Director MOUVOIR, Germany) of diverse realms, weave a choreographic tapestry challenging the essence of hospitality.
Current political enfoldings of the criminalisation of hospitality in many parts of the world as well as concepts of Jacques Derrida and Anne Dufourmantelle and utopian common spaces found their way into the project. Together, they embark on a journey of deconstructing the notion of "at-home" and exploring the possibilities of cultivating a shared garden in the tapestry of continuity, cycles, and interconnected threads.

Stephanie Thiersch and MOUVOIR most recently guested at tanzhaus nrw presenting performance concert HELLO TO EMPTINESS in 2022. Authentic as well as experimental, MOUVOIR's multi-layered productions negotiate modern life’s essential fields. As an uncompromising observer, Stephanie Thiersch dissects her environment with MOUVOIR: pop culture, philosophy, and visual arts are her tools. Thiersch sees her choreographic work within a broader conception of interdisciplinary movement research, which currently primarily incorporates music into choreographic thinking.

UNTIL THE BEGINNINGS was created in a transcontinental collaboration with École des Sables and Alesandra Seutin. École des Sables is an international centre for traditional and contemporary African dance, a school for theoretical and practical teaching, a research laboratory, and a place for encounters and exchanges, conferences and artistic residencies for dancers and choreographers from Africa, the African diaspora, and different cultures from around the world. Alesandra Seutin has been the artistic director at École des Sables since 2020. The international performer, choreographer, and lecturer was born in Harare, Zimbabwe. She studied dance in Europe, Africa, Asia, and the United States. She also completed her training at École des Sables in Senegal, where she was a student of Germaine Acogny, who passed on her technique. Today, Alesandra Seutin is an ambassador of this technique, which she teaches at École des Sables as well as around the globe.