Agathe Djokam | Research Trip

August - September 2023 — Dance

Cameroonian dancer and choreographer Agathe Djokam will undertake a research trip in Geneva from 7 August to 3 September 2023 to continue a collaboration established during her residency in 2021.

Agathe will be focusing on developing the existential piece “À NOUS LES TOURS”, which reinterprets her solo “À qui le tour?” as a duo with Geneva-based dancer and choreographer Alex Landa Aguirreche. The works are inspired by Agathe’s own story, and explore the physical and mental experiences of loss, grief and mourning.

During her time in Geneva, Agathe will be hosted by Pipóka Company, where Alex is artistic director. The company is mostly involved in dance education, developing a series of workshops for children and teenagers in theatres such as Vidy Lausanne, Comédie de Genève, TPR La Chaux de Fonds and TLH Sierre.

As part of their collaborative process of getting to know each other’s movement language and interaction with an audience, Agathe will give two performances of her work “Energie”, which includes flashes of hip-hop, contemporary and traditional African dance, at the Bains des Pâquis and Le Relais, Petit-Lancy. The aim of these showings is for the artists to observe and exchange around their respective performance styles.

Agathe and Alex plan to present “À NOUS LES TOURS” on 25 August (TBC) at the Studio de La Ribot Ensemble.

BIOGRAPHIES

Born in 1990, Agathe Tamo Djokam has been interested in art since a young age. With a background in hip hop and break dancing, her work is highly physical and technical, as well as durational. As a dancer and choreographer, she has created and presented dance pieces at the Institut Français Cameroun, Biennale of Dance in Africa 2020 and the Biennale of dance in Lyon 2021, as well as many other festivals and on the street. Agathe is continually expanding her practice through training in acting, dramaturgical writing, staging and dance in Cameroon, in Senegal at the Ecole des Sables, and in France at the Menagerie de Verre and at the National Center of Music. She is the founder of the company Agathe Djokam and the association Corpo Symbios, and is one of the dance workers for the online workshops organised by ESAD and Science Po of Reims as part of Africa 2020. Agathe’s choreography is based on ongoing research into a technique called Djibi Badjep (Go and Return) which involves reflection on the body in a process of construction-deconstruction-reconstruction.

Alex Landa Aguirreche is a dancer, choreographer, pedagogue and cultural administrator of Basque-Spanish origin based in Geneva. After studying at the Institut d’Etudes Politiques in Strasbourg, he trained in the Bachelor Contemporary Dance at the Manufacture de Lausanne. Between 2017 and 2023 he worked as a dancer with the choreographers Foofwa d’Imobilité/Cie Neopost Foofwa, Guilherme Botelho/Cie Alias, Jasmine Morand/Cie Prototype status, Maria la Ribot/La Ribot Ensemble, Romane Peytavin and Pierre Piton/La PP the directors Denis Maillefer/Cie Théâtre en Flammes and Clémentine Colpin/Cie Canicule. In 2018 he created collectively with Maryfé Singy, Cédric Gagneur and Sarah Bucher the pieces Kiss me Blue and Krolok. In 2019 he founded the company Pipóka in Geneva and created Origami Landscapes, a show-workshop for children. He then collaborated as a choreographer on plays with directors Nina Negri, Lola Giouze and Joan Mompart. In 2023 he starts a new project in duo with percussionist Dorian Selmi. As a contemporary dance pedagogue he explores the infinite capacities of the body to transform itself through improvisation and composition. He has developed several mediation projects including Hors Normes, in collaboration with Nina Negri.