Ballet du Grand Théâtre de Genève + Eastman

Dear audience members,

It is with immense joy that we open Danse Danse’s 2025–2026 season by welcoming the artists of the Ballet du Grand Théâtre de Genève and Eastman Company. And with them, we celebrate the long-awaited return of choreographer Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui, an artist we hold dear.

Larbi returns to Montréal with the richness and sensitivity of an artistic vision that continues, with each encounter, to move us and rekindle our passion for his work. His latest creation, Ihsane, is a sweeping visual and choreographic fresco—an intimate tribute to his father and his Moroccan roots. On stage, about twenty dancers, joined by exceptional singers and musicians, perform amidst sumptuous set designs.

We are incredibly proud to launch our 28th season with this major production. Thank you for being with us tonight.

Enjoy the show!

Pierre Des Marais — Artistic and Executive Director of Danse Danse.

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Territorial Acknowledgement

Danse Danse acknowledges that we are gathered on the traditional and unceded territory of the Kanien’keha:ka Nation. We honour the continued presence of Indigenous peoples on the Tiohtiá:ke (Montreal) territory, which has long served as a meeting place for exchanges between nations. With respect for the links to the past, present and future, we thank the Indigenous peoples for reminding us of the importance of living in harmony with ourselves, with each other and with nature, and we are grateful for the opportunity to present works of living art at Tiohtiá:ke.

Ihsane brings together artists from the Ballet du Grand Théâtre de Genève and Eastman, coming from Lebanon, Tunisia, Morocco, Iran, and beyond. The piece is an exercise in reconciliation and attempts to transcend conflict - both personal and geopolitical - while toying with the reductive generic ideas of the Arab world prevalent in the West. We explore the depth of Moroccan identity, its ambiguities, contradictions, and its generous grace. I intend to come as a translator of this content, using the Arabic language as the starting point of my own movement language: not in separate letters, but as something cursive, flowing, and ever changing. Ihsane translates as benevolence, or kindness, perfection. It tries to embody humanistic and spiritual ideals, a heritage I owe to my father, whom I lost when I was 19, exactly 30 years ago. The work is the choreographed funeral I never attended. It tries to remember people we have lost and bring them back into the present.

I’m truly grateful to Danse Danse for embracing this work and for being the first in North America to welcome it with such openness. Being able to present my work to Canadian audiences at Danse Danse is something I value deeply. Our connection is one of rare continuity — something invaluable to artists — sustained across different chapters of my life and my career. I am deeply moved to be able to share this particular artistic exploration.

Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui – Choreographer and Artistic Director, Ballet du Grand Théâtre de Genève.

In Arabic, the word Ihsane represents an ideal of goodness, kindness and benevolence. In Islam, it refers to a form of communion with the universe. With Ihsane, Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui continues a diptych begun within his Eastman company with Vlaemsch (chez moi), in 2022. While Vlaemsch was dedicated to his mother and his Flemish roots, Ihsane explores his relationship with his father, who left Morocco for Flanders, emigrating but always retaining — despite leaving — an unconditional love for his home country. Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui was still a teenager when his father died. Thirty years later, he searched for him in vain in a Tangier cemetery too full of graves. He continues to search for him through this creation bringing together dancers from the Ballet du Grand Théâtre de Genève and Eastman. 

But in Belgium, Ihsane is also associated with a racist and homophobic crime that took place in Liège in 2012: a young homosexual man of 32, of Moroccan origin, beaten to death outside a nightclub. As someone who himself identifies as an artist, a queer and an Arab, Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui identifies with and pays tribute to him through this production which revisits his family story. Ihsane is a journey towards the quest for inner peace, and the attempt to transcend conflict, abandonment and forgetting. Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui dances the questions that obsess him: what do we have left when our home slips away and fades? How can multiple identities coexist in the same body? 

As ever, the choreographer has assembled a unique artistic team, reflecting the effervescence and artistic vitality of this region of the world to which Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui is linked through his ancestors. Tunisian musician and viola d'amore virtuoso, Jasser Haj Youssef, compose the music and perform it onstage with Moroccan singer Mohammed El Arabi-Serghini and Lebanese singer Fadia Tomb El-Hage. Stage design is from visual artist Amine Amharech, who creates sensory and sensitive spaces into which Moroccan influences are often melded, while costumes are by fashion designer Amine Bendriouich, who elevates traditional forms of Berber clothing beyond norms and gender. 

With Ihsane, Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui watches fathers fall and the world change in a never-ending cycle of destruction and rebirth. He is wary of cultures when they imprison and separate individuals. He prefers geography in the making, ever-changing landscapes, and the shared space where we coexist. In this space, he reveals the invisible threads that connect us to each other.

World Premiere November 13, 2024, Grand Théâtre de Genève

Co-producers Eastman, Théâtre du Châtelet (Paris), Théâtres de la ville de Luxembourg, Tanz Köln , Internationaal Theater Amsterdam, Festspielhaus St. Pölten, Grec Festival Barcelona 2025, Centre National des Arts (Ottawa).

Choreography Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui.

Scenography Amine Amharech.

Costumes Amine Bendriouich.

Lighting Fabiana Piccioli

Music Jasser Haj Youssef.

Video Maxime Guislain.

Dramatist El Arbi El-Harti.

Sound design Alexandre Dai Castaing.

Rehearsal director Manuel Renard.

Choreographic assistants Pascal Marty, Patrick Williams Seebacher.

Musicians Jasser Haj Youssef - viole d’amour. Gaël Cadoux/Guillaume Poncelet - piano Rhodes. Nizar Rohana – Oud. Gabriele Miracle Bragantini – percussion.

Singers Mohammed El Arabi Serghini, Fadia Tomb El-Hage.

Dancers of Ballet du Grand Théâtre de Genève & Eastman.

Texts Timothy Winter, John Owuchekwa, RTL TV Les Orages de la Vie, Jason Silva.

Ballet du Grand Théâtre de Genève

Executive director Aviel Cahn.

Ballet director Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui.

Partner of Ballet du Grand Théâtre INDOSUEZ WEALTH MANAGEMENT.

With support from DANCE REFLECTIONS by Van Cleef & Arpels.