IN THE WOODS

The sound of a cello begins a sensory and poetic stroll through the trees, discovering the animals that inhabit the forest. Feathered, furry, under a carapace or naked, they appear at the edge of the wood, at the bend of a trunk or the corner of a leaf. The tiny becomes giant, the majestic touching, the banal marvelous. Through the dance of a dead leaf, the walk of a deer or the awakening of a butterfly, the beauty of life is revealed. The wind and rain caress us and carry us away, all senses awake, on the lookout for the next encounter. Charlotte Bouriez, director and actress, and Hanna Kölbel, cellist, combine music, voice, puppets and materials to create this gentle, sensitive exploration. For each performance, they go for a walk, relying on what's happening in the moment. An allegro step, a slow ascent, a sudden run or a still observation: the rhythm and musical themes vary according to the paths taken, and don't always offer the same encounters. More than 10 different animal puppets, both realistic and dreamlike, have been created by puppeteer Polina Borisova. They don't all appear every time, as if to further stimulate the imagination.

Graduate of the Institut National Supérieur des Arts du Spectacle in Brussels, Charlotte Bouriez is an actress and singer. Alongside concerts of jazz, French chanson and contemporary music, she pursues a career as an actress, which includes puppetry. She is a member of the ARTRAfounded in Liège in 2018 with Belgian artists. In variable formation, they invent an artistic language that blends their disciplines and in which colors, words, gestures and sounds respond to each other. She directs and performs for the shows they put on in museums and poetry scenes. Through these different experiences, Charlotte Bouriez learns the importance of transdisciplinarity in art, as a means of multiplying the gaze and opening up the minds of artists and audiences alike. When she became a mother and discovered the specific nature of language and sensory stimulation in toddlers, she wanted to create a show for them. She shared this project with Hanna Kölbelcellist and composer, who studied at the Stuttgart Conservatory, the Ghent School of the Arts and worked with the ICTUS ensemble.

charlottebouriez.com/dans-les-bois