Folia

Photo: Jorge Fatauros
On this photo: Jeanne Solan, Gérard Lemaître

Choreographer: William Forsythe

'Folia' is the second ballet William Forsythe has added to the repertoire of NDT. It revolves around a process of destruction on a small and intimate scale. "Destruction is something I understand", says Forsythe.

According to the choreographer this ballet requires no further explanation: "It is very easy to understand. It is a pas de deux about an ongoing love affair between a man and a woman. The relationship is destroyed by a power struggle, which entails an extreme repression of both partner and an endless series of frustrations."

Both the music and the ballet express the desolate situation in which two partners can possibly end up. Forsythe shows the process of destruction by starting in a ballet-like manner, which transforms in a loose structure by allowing the two dancers to escape from the dance form; losing control of the artificial setting while morphing this setting in autonomous movements of the body.