La voix humaine

House director Wouter Van Looy, house artist Naomi Beeldens and pianist Jeroen Malaise present their own interpretation of La Voix humaine by the French composer Francis Poulenc (1899-1963) on the basis of a written work by Jean Cocteau (1889-1963). 

In a desperate telephone conversation, a woman makes a final attempt to get back her lover. She creates a web of words - fearful, yearning, hysterical - as a safety net in her struggle for survival in the face of the imminent void. The gradual realisation that her lover has chosen once and for all to be with someone else drives her to despair, until the connection is literally broken.

In the staging by the soprano Naomi Beeldens and director Wouter Van Looy, the stage is a mind map in which props and chalk lines are the only tangible remains of a lost relationship. The woman, in an obscure, film-like space, seems to be staging her own death and obsessively keeping her love alive in endless repetition.

In the background, a dancer gives shape to the absent lover, while the pianist and composer Jeroen Malaise brings Francis Poulenc’s score impressively to life.

Credits

• Composition • Francis Poulenc
• Text • Jean Cocteau
• Concept • Wouter Van Looy / Naomi Beeldens / Jeroen Malaise
• Direction | Scenography • Wouter Van Looy
• Lighting design • Peter Quasters
• Costumes • Lotte Stek
• Soprano • Naomi Beeldens
• Piano • Jeroen Malaise
• Dance • Sheila Rojas