Aichi Triennale 2025: A Time Between Ashes and Roses, Period:September 13 to November 30, 2025, 79 days, Venues: Aichi Arts Center, Aichi Prefectural Ceramic Museum, Seto CityAichi Triennale 2025: A Time Between Ashes and Roses, Period:September 13 to November 30, 2025, 79 days, Venues: Aichi Arts Center, Aichi Prefectural Ceramic Museum, Seto City

What’s On

Selma & Sofiane Ouissi

  • Performing Arts
  • Aichi Arts Center

Performances

Japan PremiereDance
Bird
  • “Bird” 2023
  • Photo: Pol Guillard
  • “Bird” 2023
  • Photo: Pol Guillard
  • “Bird” 2023
  • Photo: Pol Guillard
  • “Bird” 2023
  • Photo: Pol Guillard
Can humans and other creatures live together in today’s world? A dance with a dove is the beginning of a performance played out through unforeseeable events, silences, breaths, and shared gazes.

Bird was inspired by Selma and Sofiane Ouissi’s encounter with doves that lived in what had once been a movie theater. On the stage, a dancer and a dove share the same space and engage in an unpredictable dialogue by means of their bodies while respecting each other’s existence. Its poetic and subtle expression rethinks the essence of “living together” in various parts of the world.
The Ouissi pair have thus far made works that take the human body, memory, and social relationships as their themes while crossing the boundaries between various media, including choreography, videos, and installations. By transcending anthropocentric perspectives, they carve out new relations with existences that are accidental, uncertain acquaintances.

Date
  • MEET THE ARTIST
  • Childcare Services
  • Childcare Services
Venue

Aichi Prefectural Art Theater, Mini Theater (B1F)
(1-13-2 Higashisakura, Higashi-ku, Nagoya)

Performance time

50 min.

Language

Non-verbal

Tickets
Adult
¥3,500
U25
¥2,000

* Same-day tickets (General and U25) are ¥500 more than the advance price.
* Pair tickets (6,500 Yen) are sold only in advance.

Ticket Purchase

Seating

Unreserved

Staff
Artistic direction:
Selma & Sofiane Ouissi
Performance:
Sofiane Ouissi, Jihed Khmiri, pigeons
Performance flyer

It will be released at a later date.

Assistance for viewing
[Before you attend]
  • This is a non-verbal work.
  • This work features live pigeons. Visitors with feather allergies or sensitivities to birds are advised to take precautions.
  • Preschool-aged children are welcome to attend this performance. Children of preschool age may attend for free if they sit on an accompanying adult’s lap. A ticket is required for children who need a separate seat (U25 tickets are available).Childcare service is available for parents or guardians who wish to attend alone.
  • Visitors using wheelchairs are asked to contact i-Ticket at 0570-00-5310.
  • This performance features live pigeons. Service dogs must wait in a designated area near the entrance during the performance.
[Childcare Services]
Childcare services are available. Advance reservation is required. Further details will be announced on the official website at a later date.
[MEET THE ARTIST ()]
A talk with the cast and director(s) will follow the performance. Audience members are welcome to attend without a reservation.
  • Japanese-French consecutive interpretation is available.
  • Live text support via UD Talk.

Profile

  • Selma Ouissi, born 1975 in Tunis, Tunisia. Based in Tunis, Tunisia and Paris, France.
  • Sofiane Ouissi, born 1972 in Tunis, Tunisia. Based in Tunis, Tunisia.

Bird is a work created by the Tunisian-born brother-and-sister duo of Selma and Sofiane Ouissi. It was inspired by their encounter with doves that lived in what had once been a movie theater. At that time, the space that formerly existed there for people and their stories had been turned into a sanctuary for other living beings. Seeing this phenomenon, they said there arose in their minds the earnest question of how we who have experienced isolation during the pandemic again live together with nature. On the stage, a dancer and a dove share the same space and engage in an unpredictable dialogue by means of their bodies while respecting each other’s existence.
The Ouissi pair have thus far made works that take the human body, memory, and social relationships as their themes while crossing the boundaries between various media, including choreography, videos, and installations. In 2007, they jointly established L’Art Rue, a platform aimed at social change through art. In Tunis, the capital of the Republic of Tunisia, the two launched Dream City, a multi-disciplinary art festival, for which they also serve as the co-directors. They are attracting attention as creators driving the art scene in Arabian countries and North Africa.
In 2023, Bird was performed at venues including the Sharjah Biennial, the Festival d’Automne, and KANAL-Centre Pompidou (Brussels). Its poetic and subtle expression rethinks the essence of “living together” in various parts of the world. In it, a dove and a person interact as life forms with roots here and there in an urban environment. When we watch it, will we human beings be able to find a new involvement with other creatures, without considering ourselves privileged existences? By transcending anthropocentric perspectives, we can carve out new relations with existences that are accidental, uncertain acquaintances.

Selected performances and screening
2024
“Bird,” Festival d’Automne (Paris, France)
2023
“Bird,” Sharjah Biennial 15: Thinking Historically in the Present (UAE)
2020
Video screening, “Wajdan,” Guggenheim Abu Dhabi (UAE)
2017
“Le moindre geste,” 49 Nord 6 Est Frac Lorraine (Metz, France)
2014
“Les yeux d’Argos,” Tate Modern (London, UK)

Related Information