The Schools Pavilion: La Neuvième école ("The Ninth School")
How do we materialise the unthought, spark the unexpected, break from the formats that elide past consciousness into creative movement? How do we make a procedure that opens up the possible within the narrow framework of an international exposition? How do we share the experimental process, the hunt for new concepts, the often disarrayed momentum of the imaginary? Rather than organise a selection of the most brilliant students and emerging artists and present their final works, why not first create a space to liberate the imagination and create together?
Brought together under the auspices of ARTCENA, the French National centre for circus arts, street arts and theatre, the pedagogic directors of eight higher education institutions teaching scenography in France dreamt of a "Ninth school", a utopia that brings together a student from each school in order to build a team for the thought, conception and production of the pavilion, accompanied by Philippe Quesne.
It’s a done deal. As of October 2018, the eight students making up the "Ninth School" meet each month at the Nanterre-Amandiers theatre, to create together, workshop by workshop, their French schools pavilion.
Under the artistic direction of Philippe Quesne, the “Ninth School” is growing in a space brimming with performance artistry. The students have the opportunity to take advantage of the incredible production tools at Nanterre-Amandiers and to go behind the curtain of theatre production.
Gradually, throughout the adventure and during each meeting of this utopian school, the schools pavilion itself has been christened “The Ninth School”. As a given.
In the style of an explorer’s log, the works, inspirations and paths taken by the “Ninth School” are collected and documented in the Logbook.
Find more information about the finished project here.