The choreographer and her team will be welcomed at the Maison de la culture du Plateau-Mont-Royal in 2024 for periods of residency and cultural mediation activities with the borough’s citizens.
Milan Gervais
Milan Gervais has worked as a choreographer in the contemporary dance community in Montreal since 2009. She founded Human Playground in 2013 and currently serves as its artistic director. Human Playground is a creative organization that offers a space for moving dialogue among bodies, the urban, and society. Milan holds two bachelor’s degrees (media and communications, contemporary dance) and a DESS (graduate diploma) in event design from UQÀM. As a designer, she contributes to renewed practices in the urban space, exploring usage and living elements for a fresh take on the experience of the body in the city.
Creating around the body
Gervais’ new creation marks a return to performance after 15 years’ investigation of concrete space. Her choreographic vision aligns with her understanding of the body as it is incarnated, inscribed, and configured in society. Among the bodies in motion around her in everyday life she discerns a fascinating, invisible division, and her dance subtly incorporates elements of the ordinary. Her artistic practice is informed by this sensitivity to everyday bodies combined with a profound awareness of the social and environmental issues of our time.
Compelled by a desire to interact directly with reality and create in out-of-the-ordinary settings, she has instinctively placed her work in the street, the public space, and various non-places, anchoring her choreography and scenography in the very subjects of her work: Autofiction (2009), Intersection (2012), Run (2014), Parking (2017), Inscape (2019), L’autre maintenant [The other now] (2021).
About the residency
Created in partnership with La danse sur les routes du Québec and the City of Montréal’s Maisons de la culture network, this residency helps dance creation projects come to fruition. It also facilitates cultural mediation projects, creating a sense of connection with communities and anchoring the program in a municipal cultural setting.
