par Terre Dance Company / Anne Nguyen

Anne Nguyen founded the par Terre Dance Company in 2005. Her choreographic style is conceptual, and stands at the crossroads between hip-hop movements and contemporary choreography. Having studied science, the dancer and choreographer uses mathematical and geometrical principles to transform the centrifugal force of breakdance into linear patterns. Her long time practice of martial arts (capoeira, Brazilian jiu-jitsu…) inspires her to research into bodily contact. The construction of her choreographies originates from particular conceptions of the scenic space. Movement is deconstructed, and its fragments, used as an abstract symbolic language, are worked into the choreographic frames.

“Hip-hop dancer and choreographer Anne Nguyen, expert in breakdance (acrobatic floor-dance) intrigues by her ability to shift the front of hip-hop towards enigmatic, spectacular spaces.”

(Rosita Boisseau - Télérama Sortir - Dec. 2008)

Anne Nguyen’s solo Square Root (2007) relates the geometry of breakdance movements to the contemporary urban environment. It combines mathematical dance compositions with some of Anne's poems. This solo received the second prize of the 2009 Masdanza contemporary choreography contest. Anne Nguyen also choreographed Keep it Funky! (2007), a Locking (funk dance) group piece, and Spirit of the Underground (2008), a performance for five dancers and one actress, where she exposes the results of her research into the techniques and the symbolism of contact. Her duet Yonder Woman (2010) analyzes the notion of performance, in an experimental game based on linear progress and relationship behaviours. Her new 2012 creation PROMENADE OBLIGATOIRE is a one hour walk for eight dancers continuously crossing along the timeline, where she looks into the different possible states of being “together” as a group. In 2013, Anne Nguyen will be creating a new quartet.

"With her own creations, Anne Nguyen proves how women can skillfully alter this mostly masculine domain. She gives a brand new face to powermoves –with a method that has very masculine connotations, dismantling series of moves and reconstructing them. Circles are turned into linear courses, right angles and interrupted trajectories. Thus is created a lively modular system, a blend of breakdance and contact dance which dissolves the body’s natural order, like in Pablo Picasso. Anne Nguyen applies the principle to legworks. Paradoxically, with her, it looks natural." (Thomas Hahn - Tanz - Dec. 2010)