Boris Charmatz - Musée de la Danse: Expo Zéro

Musée de la Danse: Expo Zéro is a living exhibition created by renowned French choreographer Boris Charmatz for his groundbreaking Musée de la Danse (Dancing Museum) in Rennes, France, and now being re-conceived for New York City as part of Performa 11. Musée de la Danse: Expo Zéro is an exhibition without any artwork, but with artists. It includes no objects, photographs, sculptures, or installations. Rather, it is comprised of completely empty rooms filled by the gestures, projects, bodies, stories, and dances which visitors will both see and imagine. In this way, it is truly a “museum of dance,” a radical new way of looking at the history and future of that most ephemeral of art forms, through a unique live experience that each visitor will have with an extraordinary cast of people and performers inhabiting a seemingly blank gallery space. For Musée de la Danse: Expo Zéro, Charmatz has selected ten international figures from contemporary dance, visual art, architecture, philosophy, and performance theory and criticism to be “in residence” at the project site for a three-day “think tank.” Participants include: Alex Baczynski-Jenkins (dancer/choreographer), Eleanor Bauer (dancer/choreographer), Heman Chong (visual artist/curator), Jim Fletcher (actor), Lenio Kaklea (dancer/choreographer), Jan Liesegang (architect), Valda Setterfield (dancer/actress), Marcus Steinweg (philosopher), and Fadi Toufiq (writer/artist). Following the think tank, Musée de la Danse: Expo Zéro will open to the public for three days during museum hours, at which time visitors can be led on specially guided tours by one or more of the participants. Equal parts artistic project, institutional platform, and political proposition, Musée de la Danse: Expo Zéro will undoubtedly have a lasting impact on not only the New York City dance scene, but on the larger culture as well. Co-curated by Boris Charmatz and Martina Hochmuth. Lead Curator for Performa: Lana Wilson.