Point Némo
When: 25.09.2026 21:00
Where: 48.857614, 2.346758
Organizer: Admin
Also, to that question posed six thousand years ago by the Ecclesiastic: “Who has ever been able to probe the depths of the abyss?”, two men among all men have the right to answer now. Captain Nemo and I.
Jules Verne, Vingt Mille Lieues sous les mers,, Paris, J. Hetzel, 1871, p. 434
At the genesis of this artistic project carried by the Belgian collective FC Bergman, which brings together Stef Aerts, Joé Agemans and Marie Vinck, a score: Drumming, the longest work ever written by the American Steve Reich. In 1970, after returning from a trip to Ghana where he studied African percussion, he composed, over a year, this extraordinary piece created at the Museum of Modern Art in New York on September 3, 1971. Based on a single rhythmic motif, Drumming can give the appearance of repetitive, perhaps static, music. Yet the composer employs the technique of phase shifting that he then masters perfectly and the work changes constantly, thereby creating another relationship to time for the listener. Often cited to illustrate the minimalist music current, Drumming mobilizes both percussion and voice, as well as silence. FC Bergman draws from this approach, both musical and transcendental, the source of its inspiration.
As the idea of Point Nemo emerges on the horizon of this new creation, the project of an abstract response to an abstract music blossoms. Indeed, what better for the collective FC Bergman, whose work revolves around the “vast world” and humanity’s quest for bearings in a space‑time where each seeks his place, than Point Nemo, the place farthest from any inhabited land? Except that here, Point Nemo is not understood in the literal sense, but rather in the figurative sense, like a cemetery of hope, where any attempt to control existence would be futile.
Adapted, shaped and dictated by the music, the stage installation gradually becomes the main character of this show. Conceived as a performance and devoid of text, Point Nemo is a wandering through the fragments of the inhabited world, where the Garden of Eden, artificial because controlled by the hand of man, slowly falls apart. A way to remind us of our own humanity: to accept the illusion of control in order to better contemplate the beauty of life. An experience that is simultaneously auditory, sensory and physical, Point Nemo is a metaphor for existence, or an ode to letting go.
Secrets of a work
To learn more about Point Nemo, a presentation of the show takes place 45 minutes before the start of the performance, in the Salon Diaghilev, by Aurélien Poidevin, editorial director of the Châtelet, Monday 28 and Tuesday 29 September 2026 (free access, reserved for ticket holders for that day’s performance).
Backstage on Tuesday 29 September 2026 after the performance
Tags: installation art, live music, concert
Source: https://www.paris.fr/evenements/point-nemo-112219
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