After American choreographer William Forsythe’s cutting-edge performance “Heterotopia” last month, Korea’s dance scene is welcoming yet another experimental work from overseas, this time by French choreographer Maguy Marin.

Titled “Salves,” the dance features “pessimism that dominates today’s world,” according to its local promoters. The piece premiered in Lyon, France, in 2010, and received rave reviews from the French press.

The 62-year-old is often compared to the late German choreographer Pina Bausch (1940-2009), as both of them are known for their works that combine contemporary dance and theatrical performance. This is the second time her troupe, Compagnie Maguy Marin, is performing in Korea. Their first Korean visit took place in 2003. 

Marin was born in 1951 to Spanish immigrants in Toulouse, France, and started ballet training when she was 8. She danced as a member of Strasbourg Opera Ballet until she entered the Mudra School, founded by Maurice Bejart in Brussels, in 1970. She learned other forms of performing arts, including theater, while attending the school for three years.

“The three years at Mudra School seem to have been a huge influence in Marin’s career,” said LG Arts Center, the local organizer of the upcoming performance in Seoul.

She joined Ballet du XXe sicle while attending Mudra School, and started her career as a choreographer there. In 1981, she introduced her iconic work, “May B,” based on Samuel Beckett’s 1952 Absurdist play “Waiting for Godot.” In the grotesque piece, she featured 10 dancers who are covered in mud and dust, wearing special costumes that make them look obese ― going against the traditional aesthetics of dance performance. She founded her own troupe, Compagnie Maguy Marin, in 1978, and is one of the very few non-American artists to have won the American Dance Festival Award.

“Salves” features seven dancers. It takes place in an unexplained indoor space that looks like a “residential house in times of war” or a “secret shelter for natural disaster refugees.” The seven dancers, at one point, set a meal on their table, and then try to escape the property the next minute.

Throughout the dance, viewers can hear the loud, intimidating sound of gunshots, from outside of the property. The gunshots make the dancers anxious and terrified, and their attempts to escape result in failure. The piece is said to depict the reality of the contemporary world, where “there is no exit” from problems and suffering.

“The dance is almost like a disaster movie or a play,” said LG Arts Center. “It is very theatrical. While its beginning is very chaotic, its ending is the opposite; it’s very beautiful, almost like looking at an abstract painting.”

“Salves” runs from June 5 to 7 at LG Arts Center in southern Seoul. Tickets range from 40,000 won to 80,000 won. For more information, call (02) 2005-0114.

By Claire Lee (dyc@heraldcorp.com)