Have a Safe Travel starts from a personal experience and then goes beyond it. It refers to the time Eli Mathieu-Bustos was stopped by the police on a train, the first time his skin colour became the pretext for an abuse of power. In choreographic writing, one’s experience turns into knowledge incarnate manifesting itself in a sharp and grounded physical virtuosity that transcends all attempts to capture identity. An autodidact passionate about improvisation, Eli Mathieu-Bustos creates his own language mixing different choreographic styles. German expressionist dance and butō techniques coexist with practices related to subcultures such as dance hall and house. This young artist has therefore developed his own improvisation technique, De Caelo, that allows him to turn the violence he experienced into body writing. A practice that combines today’s affective intelligence with subtle listening, in a gestural resonance with astrology. In Have a Safe Travel dance is the reverberation channel where to negotiate one’s boundaries with the outside dimension.
Eli Mathieu-Bustos is also present at Short Theatre 2023 in the section RECIPROCITY, with the workshop De Caelo practice.
Eli Mathieu-Bustos (1998) is a dancer and performer with a mixed training. He started ballet at a very young age and then went on to attend jazz and breakdance courses. He has been experimenting with new-style, poppin, krump and contemporary dance since he was seventeen. He studied Choreography at Manufacture in Aurillac and graduated from the Institute of Arts and Choreography (ISAC) of the Royal Academy of Fine Arts in Brussels. His artistic research focuses on the attempt to combine astrology and dance to create a new improvisation technique he has called De Caelo. Eli Mathieu-Bustos has collaborated with such artists and companies as Marco Torrice, Marco Arriola, Patric Chiha, Antwerp Opera and Milø Slayers. He staged his solos in various locations in Brussels, mainly in queer and FUBU contexts. He has worked for Decoratelier (Africa is/in the future 2021 and 2022 edition), LDC, Nova, CrazyCircle and Fatsabbats festival among others. He presented a studio version of Have a Safe Travel during the WIPCOOP Brussels 2022, while the complete version will debut in the Spring of 2024.
choreography, dramaturgy, performance, concept Eli Mathieu-Bustos
executive production Anaku
lighting design Maureen Béguin
sound design Loucka Fiagan
with the support of Wipcoop/ Mestizo Arts Platform, Kvs, La Bellone, Be My Guest – International Network for emerging practices, Kaaitheater, La Balsamine, Desingel, Atelier 210, Anaku, Buda for the feminist futures festival, Belluard Bollwerk festival, Short Theatre Festival
external eye Daniel Blange Gubbay, Eric Cyuzuzo Niyibizi, Maria Dogahe, Nabil Ennassouh, Jazz Guyot, Aleksandra JanevaImfeld, Brandon Kano Butare, Lukah Katangila, Krystel Khoury, Ana Kuch, Soto Labor, Sophie Sénécaut, Liza Siche-Jouan, Milø Slayers, Marie Umuhoza
sustained by Short Theatre in the frame of Be My Guest network and supported by Flanders State of Art – Vlaanderen/Verbeelding werkt.
ph. Victoriano Moreno
