Yvon has been working with sourcing voice and movement material from emotional somatic bodywork to generate contemporary, post-dramatic theatrical performance material. He is an extended vocalist who uses classical singing technique with theatrical bodywork, visuality and tactility. He created and presented an experimental piece Intimacies at the Lab.
Lab participants explored the Focusing Articulation Strategy in response to Yvon’s work.
Video 1: Performer using sensory material for movement
Video 2: Yvon Bonenfant and dancer in an extract from Intimacies
“As my work addresses itself to the visceral, it was extremely gratifying to actually have a facilitator take the work back to a place where comments emerged from the felt, lived experience of the watchers, and where the technique insisted on observers OWNING remarks”.
Yvon Bonenfant was funded by the University of Winchester to participate in the Lab, where he is Senior Lecturer in Performing Arts, teaching devised and interdisciplinary contemporary performance. He is also overseas research associate of the IDEAT Research Group of the Sorbonne.
Yvon has published an article about this work:
Bonenfant, Y. (2008) Toward a politics of felt pulsation:de-disciplining voice and movement in the making of a musi-dance performance. Accepted for publication in Studies in Theatre and Performance, Spring 2008, Intellect.