Rite of Spring

Heddy Maalem, with the help of the Sichuan Modern Dance Company, has re-worked his mould-breaking ballet along the theme of last year’s Sichuan earthquake

You are a former boxer and martial arts expert. How did you make the transition to dance?

As a boxer, I had a taste for combat and the energy of movement, but I was pushed into dance by the desperation of being a post-colonial Algerian. Dance has been like a little door through which I can escape.

How about choreography?

I started dancing too late to become a real artist, which is one reason I’m a choreographer. But I’m also a writer, and I realised that contemporary dance was opening an extraordinary field which has enlivened my body and my writing ever since.

What were your impressions of visiting the earthquake site and speaking to the Sichuan people?

I have emotional memories of the mountains of Sichuan and the unbelievable violence of the natural elements, as well as the extraordinary courage and energy of the people who lived through this tragedy and who spoke to me about it, saying the ‘mountains danced’. This is a subject of real reflection for a choreographer.

Your African Rite of Spring came under attack as some felt you were a white man depicting black dancers as ‘savages’. Do you have a response to that?

Do I have to respond to all foolish questions?

Are you concerned about any controversy with this piece?

It is never my intention to be controversial or to provoke. I try to do my job with integrity and with honesty. Anything with any depth becomes ‘sensitive’.

Do we have to become insensitive artists entertaining an anaesthetised public?

I don’t believe so. If all reactions were the same, it would be worrying, wouldn’t it? Nancy Pellegrini

Rite Of Spring is at the Haidian Theatre on Wednesday 26 and Thursday 27.

28 Zhongguancun Dajie, Haidian District, Beijing (62546839, 62555898),  海淀区中关村大街28号