About
Circul'R's Mission
Circul'R creates urban dance performances that explore the challenges of today's world through the body. Embodying the logic of digital movement with the body, artistic director Bérénice Dupuis questions alienation, disembodiment, and disconnection from nature, transforming reflections on the rhythms of our time into a living choreographic poetry.
The Circul'R company, relocated to Montreal in June 2018, was born in 2013 from the common passion of Bérénice Dupuis and David Phiphak. His creations have distinguished themselves in the world of urban and contemporary dance in several countries. After more than 25 and 15 years respectively active in the field of international breakdance battles, our work explores the playing field which revolves around the bases of floorworks from breakdance in order to create a universe open to the senses.
• September 2013 Residence IADU Paris Villette “Sans Paroles” solo by David
• October 2013 Premiere of David's solo Sans Paroles at Kalypso CCN Créteil
• January 2014 Without Words to Faces of the World Cergy
• May - June 2015: Residency in Micadanses (gestural research) Paris
• October 4, 2015: Worksite exit as part of the Harvest Festival - Suresnes.
• From October 26 to November 12, 2015: Residency presentation and mediation at the Manufacture - Aurillac
• November solo David “Sans Paroles” Manufacture 111 Paris
• January 2016 solo “Sans Paroles” Suresnes Cité Danse.
• February - April 2016: Centquatre Paris technical residency and presentation of Brains in a Vat
• Cité Danses Connexions Théatre Jean Vilar Suresnes, studio reception March 2016.
• March 2016 RamDam Vauréal solo festival “The Cave” Bérénice
• September-October 2016 Residence and mediation Jönköping, Sweden
• October 2016 Brains in a Vat at the Jonk Festival! and workshops with Dansnat in Sweden.
• October 14 and 15, 2016 Brains in a Vat at La Place Center culture Hip Hop Paris France.
• November 2016: Brains in a Vat at the Echo Echo Festival Derry Irelande
• December January 2016 Lighting laboratory at IADU Paris Vilette
• February 2017: solo stage of The Cave AT TPAM Yokohama Japan.
• Brains in a Vat at the Sorry Maman festival at Mains d'euvres Sains Ouen on March 11, 2017.
• Extract from Brains in a Vat Festival Ramdam Vauréal March 25, 2017
• Brains in a Vat Festival Street Perspektif - Raum Für Urbane Tanzkunst Cologne Germany April 28-29, 2017.
• Summer 2017 MAI Montreal Residence.
• October holidays Residence and mediation Ville d'Avray.
• November 24, 2017 Brains in a Vat long version MPT Ville d'Avray.
• December 1 Brains in a Vat off Parcours Danse Montréal
• February 2018 technical residency and presentation at 104 Paris Solo the Cave
• March 2018 Residence Centro Coregrafico La Gomera Canary Islands
• Summer 2018 Residency at MAI Montreal
• March 2019 Residence and public presentation and mediation Studios Dyptik Saint-Étienne France
• Summer 2019 Residence studio Flak Montreal
• January 2020 First Solo InstruMENTAL Tangente.
• May 2020 Premiere of Zones de Confluences at Accès Asie Montréal
Berenice Dupuis
Bérénice Dupuis creates and performs urban dance performances that explore the transformations of the body and our perceptions in the digital age. By integrating the logic of artificial movement, found in the codes of video and robotics, the company explores the tensions between embodiment and disembodiment, connection and alienation, nature and virtuality.
Circul'R appeals to a wide audience: dance enthusiasts, movement thinkers, audiences curious about technological change, and spectators seeking an innovative choreographic experience. With creations where Breaking dialogues with other artistic languages such as animation* and mime, the company offers a space for sensitive and poetic reflection on the rhythms of our time.
Rooted in a research and transmission approach, Circul'R mobilizes dancers and creators around a committed artistic vision. It structures its development around creation, diffusion, and cultural mediation, in order to renew somatic techniques to imitate technology and amplify the impact of urban dance on the contemporary scene.
This mission guides each of the organization's decisions and will evolve according to the challenges of its time and the needs of its audiences.
Research base:
The magic of numerochoreographic illusion.
In the digital age, our perception of time and movement is transformed by technology. Slow-motion videos, fast-forward rewinds, technical glitches, and robotic loops shape our relationship with reality.
Many street dances, such as animation*, carry an illusionist aesthetic and a dramaturgy of "technological" movements capable of reflecting, choreographically, important aspects of our time.
How and why can we convince people that an organic body evolves in artificial temporalities?
How to make it look fake?
What is the meaning of a dance that allows the body to resemble its dematerialized copy, an animated object?
My choreographic language lists somatic techniques according to two axes:
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Video codes: how can dance reproduce visual effects (various slow motions, glitches, rewinds, freeze frames, etc.) to give the illusion of a body on screen?
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The codes of robotics: an inventory of mechanical and programmed movements reproducible by the body. What makes a movement appear natural or artificial? At what point does it evoke an animated object?
My methodology is based on expanding the dialogue between practices from popular culture (breaking, animation), historical theatrical forms (Decroux mime) and knowledge about the functioning of modern technologies.
I apply this numero-choreographic grammar to breaking, which I have been practicing for 21 years and in which I currently compete as a member of the Canadian national team. Breaking is also a dance that plays on the unreal and the superhuman, defying the laws of physics.
The dramaturgy made possible by these techniques offers a pretext for a reflection on the artificial imitation of the natural, on the border between the real and the virtual, the animate, the autonomous and the inanimate.
The choreographies composed from this gestural repertoire bring to life the social issues linked to the disconnection with nature and the human-machine tensions specific to our time. Above all, I wish to raise awareness of the dangers of alienation from technology.
About the animation
Animation is a street dance related to popping and mime, which involves creating illusions through muscle contractions and temporalities. This style, born in the 1970s in African-American neighborhoods on the West Coast, draws inspiration from film characters such as the robot from The Wizard of Oz or the creatures in Ray Harryhausen's special effects.
Most of the mimed images, set to rhythm, evoke two types of movements:
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movements inspired by the codes of video and cinema (stop motion, freeze frame, slow motion),
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movements of automatons, robotics or mechanics.
An aesthetic of glitch (technical defect) has developed around this dance, playing on contrasts and the rupture of the logic of a perceived reality. For example, the interruption of fluid and natural movements by sequential movements, seemingly calculated in a robotic manner, creates an impression of unreality, falseness, and artifice that the animation seeks to provoke.
The popularity of dubstep, with its electronic sounds punctuated by rhythmic breaks and glitches, largely contributed to propelling this style to the mainstream.
Additional resources
📌 The problem of defining animation according to Clocks Tkin: YouTube link
📌 Interview with Boppin pioneer Andre by Jaja Vankova: YouTube link
📌 A Brief History of Animation: YouTube Link
📌 Document written by Collin Adams: Google Docs link