Herve Koubi Company, Cannes

Due to Coronavirus and closing of theaters in Serbia, Herve Koubi Company show that was scheduled for 3rd April 2020. at Theater Atelje 212 is rescheduled for 15th September 2020 at Opera Madlenianum. All tickets are valid for the new term.

The Barbarous Nights

(The Barbarous Nights, or the First Dawns of the World)

choreography: Herve Koubi
assistant to choreographer: Faycal Hamlat, Guillaume Gabriel
sound director: Maxime Bodson
music: Mozart, Faure, Wagner, Traditional Algerian Music
music arrangement: Guillaume Gabriel
lighting design: Lionel Buzonie
costumes, accessories: Guillaume Gabriel, Claudine G-Delattre
masks: Swarovsky

duration: 60’
premiere: Cannes International Dance Festival, 2016

dancers: Tomi Cinej, Kobi Elharar, Mohammed Elhilali, Abdelghani Ferradji, Pasquale Fortunato, Zakaria Ghezal, Vladimir Gruev, Oualid Guennoun, Bendehiba Maamar, Najib Meherhera, Mourad Messaoud, Houssni Mijem, Ismail Oubbajaddi , El houssaini Zahid

This piece takes root from the awe-inspiring and unavoidable story of our Mediterranean basin. This is a story about a path, it’s always about a path... Five years have been lived between France and Algeria, on opposite shores of the Mediterranean, by the famous sea that is at the origin of these unrooted people with similar pedigree and fundamental backgrounds entrenched in those whom we call Mediterraneans. I think it is necessary for everyone to believe in a universal culture which is at once shared, mixed and linked, in order to wish for an inevitably common future. Who were these Barbarians storming in from the North, the mysterious people of the sea that were often described in the Bible, chronicles and ancient monuments, often talked about without really describing who they were or where they came from? Who were these Barbarians of the East, these Persians, Ionians and Babylonians, the Arabo-Muslims? From what unknown, forgotten, reworked, assimilated or erased history from which we have inherited? I’ve chosen to bring my glaze towards what I feel is the most beautiful: the mixture of cultures and religions throughout the times to allow and help me draw the foundations of a common geography on which we today stand, all too often without knowing. I also want to seize history, open my eyes and slide towards freedom while remembering that the word Barbarian is also said as Amazigh which signifies, the Free Man. To Beauty! The one who, above wars, speaks of unity, the one who gathers all, the one who turns its back to identity claims, the one who takes the best of everyone and whom, throughout its history, honors man as its anthem. To the Mediterranean that contains so much luminosity that it blinds like a lost secret. The secret of our common lost desire and destiny. To our history which has, for over 3000 years, witnessed countless cultures whose differences have brought us together, instead of keeping us apart... No matter if we are Algerian, Spanish, French, Greek... we are first and foremost Mediterranean and this feeling of belonging is much more ancient than the concept of nations.
Herve Koubi

Roots in Algeria, pharmaceutical doctor, Hervé Koubi decided to concentrate on a career as dancer and choreographer and his studies in Aix-Marseilles University. He continued his studies at the International Dance Center with Rosella Hightower in Cannes and later at the Opera of Marseilles. In 1999, he joined the National Choreographic Centre of Nantes. After, he started collaboration with the National Choreographic Centre of Cannes and Thierry Smits Company Thor in Brussels. In 2000, Koubi created his first project “Le Golem”. Since then, he has created numerous successful projects and works. From 2010, together with dancers from Algeria and Burkina Faso, he created some unforgettable performances. Today, Koubi is regularly invited by many professional training schools throughout France as well as abroad. Since 2014, he has been Associate Choreographer at the Superior School of Dance in Cannes and the Superior School of Dance in Marseilles. From 2015 onwards, he has also been Associate Choreographer at the Conservatoire de Danse de Brive-la-Gaillarde. In July of 2015, Brigitte Lefevre presented Herve Koubi the Chevalier des Arts et des Lettres.

Nonetheless, this is a creation of poetic beauty… If Koubi can make worlds as largely absorbing as the one he conjures here, he is an important addition to dance.
© The New York Times