Highlighting the various trades involved in the creation of choreographic gesture is a key aspect of Aina Alegre and Yannick Hugron's project for the Centre chorégraphique national. In 2025 and 2026, they have chosen to support Jan Fedinger, visual artist and lighting designer, to underline the collective dynamic that underpins all artistic creation.
Jan Fedinger is originally from the Netherlands. He works in a variety of media, with light as his principal medium. His work includes performance installations, lighting creations for the stage, performances, photographs and drawings.
Jan Fedinger's work has been presented in Europe and elsewhere in the context of theater and visual art. His artistic approach is characterized by the search for and creation of territories and experiences never before known, but always already dreamed of.
Alongside his personal work, he has collaborated with artists such as Aina Alegre, Jan Martens, Jefta van Dinther, Daniel Linehan, Aitana Cordero, Thiago Granato and Alban Richard.
Jan is co-founder of Reflecting Light, a research group of international light designers that aims to formulate and map the growing role of light in the performing arts. Since 2021, this research has been integrated into KASK, the Royal School of the Arts in Ghent, Belgium.
His work land[e]scapes 4 - redistribution of wealth by nature [working title] is currently on tour, as are his visual creations for Jan Martens' Any Attempt Will End in Crushed Bodies and Shattered Bones, R-A-U-X-A, THIS IS NOT (AN ACT OF LOVE & RESISTANCE) and Aina Alegre's RÉVERBÉRATIONS- ÉTUDE 8.
Jan Fedinger is associate artist at the Centre chorégraphique national de Grenoble (2025-2026).
RESIDENCY AT CCN GRENOBLE
JUNE 29-30, 2024
DECEMBER 21-22, 2024
WITH THE ARTISTS: Ruth Childs, Katerina Andreou, Bryan Campbell, Luara Raio
SUPPORT: CCN de Grenoble, Pavillon/ADC, in progress
RESIDENCY AT CCN GRENOBLE
FROM JANUARY 2024 TO DECEMBER 2025
JUNE 29-30, 2024
DECEMBER 21-22, 2024
On arriving for her residency in the CCN Grenoble studio, facing the mountains, Ruth Childs found herself thinking about the artists who had passed through this place before her and would do so after her. She knew some of them very well, others a little less, by name or by sight, others not at all. She was struck by the lack of connection between them. She wanted to leave a note of encouragement, a surprise, check in, ask a question about something she'd picked up from their work. But due to lack of time, caught up in her own work, her thoughts simply materialized in the form of "likes" via social networks, a Facebook or Instagram page.
To combat this lack of exchange, symptomatic of the current era, she drew inspiration from the free, intimate, handwritten correspondences of Judson Church members (Steve Paxton, Yvonne Rainer, Lucinda Childs...) to imagine a space-time for correspondence with a small group of artists. A space-time to exchange ideas, ask questions, get lost together, have fun, tell each other details of their artistic questionings and troubles. These exchanges can be short and spontaneous (like a postcard) or more polished (like a letter), but will preferably be handwritten and sent by post.
The primary aim of this project is to open up and share the experience of a genuine long-term exchange. In a second phase, and in agreement with the group, we could consider publishing some or all of the correspondence produced in 2026.
As part ofIMPACT FESTIVAL 2024, Delicate People is a project initiated by Ruth Childs and Cécile Bouffard to combine their respective practices of dance and sculpture. Delicate People is a series of vignettes dealing with figures and motifs of troubling identities and adjusted gestures.
Ruth Childs delves into the intimate layers of her physical and emotional memories, triggered by the great classical music tunes, from Beethoven to Tchaikovsky or Dvorak, that she listened to as a child. Programmed at the IMPACT FESTIVAL 2023.
Ruth Childs proposes to make accessible the hyper-presence of a body in performance, the present moment, as well as the collective aspect of preparing for a performance and experiencing this ephemeral moment. Through the body and its use in movement, participants will share a collective yet intimate experience that connects them to their own creativity. Guided by the choreographer, they will draw on an unusual repertoire to nourish their imaginations. In this way, grimace, color and melody will become choreographic tools that will lead them to create performances in natural spaces. Information by e-mail: helene.azzaro@ccn-grenoble.com
For several years now, Ruth Childs has been working on a project to re-create the early works of her aunt, Lucinda Childs, an emblematic figure of American postmodern dance and the minimalist movement. On December 13, 2023, she worked with students in the specialized dance cycle at the Grenoble Conservatory, inviting them to work on this choreographic vocabulary: simple gestures, a taste for repetition and variation, devices that play on trajectories. On March 6, 2024, she will once again be working with Grenoble Conservatory dance students, this time exploring the choreographic material of her last two pieces, Fantasia and Blast!