In Ihsane, Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui returns to his family history, his Moroccan roots and the question of how multiple identities can exist within one body. Dancers from Ballet du Grand Théâtre de Genève and Eastman perform a grand, layered and moving work about fathers, loss, connection and the search for inner peace. With live music by Tunisian viola d’amore virtuoso Jasser Haj Youssef, Moroccan singer Mohammed El Arabi-Serghini and Lebanese singer Fadia Tomb El Hage.
In Arabic, Ihsane represents an ideal of goodness, kindness and benevolence. Within Islam, the word also refers to a form of communion with the universe. With this work, Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui continues the diptych he began in 2022 with Vlaemsch (chez moi). While that piece was dedicated to his mother and his Flemish roots, Ihsane turns towards his father, who left Morocco for Flanders but always held on to a deep love for his country of origin.
Cherkaoui was still a teenager when his father died. Thirty years later, he searched for him in vain in an overcrowded cemetery in Tangier. In Ihsane, that search continues, not as a literal reconstruction, but as a journey through memory, ancestry and longing. What remains when home begins to fade? How do you carry multiple histories, languages and identities within the same body?
A personal tribute
In Belgium, the name Ihsane also evokes another, painful history. In 2012, Ihsane Jarfi, a 32-year-old gay man of Moroccan origin, was beaten to death outside a nightclub in Liège. As an artist, a queer person and an Arab, Cherkaoui recognises something of himself in him and, with this production, also pays tribute to his life. In this way, Ihsane connects the personal with the political. The performance speaks of family and loss, but also of exclusion, racism, homophobia and the ways in which cultures can confine or separate people. Cherkaoui chooses another kind of space: a shared space, where movement reveals the invisible threads that connect us to one another.
Music, image and movement from a shared landscape
For Ihsane, Cherkaoui brings together a rich artistic team that reflects the vitality of the region to which he is connected through his ancestors. Tunisian musician and viola d’amore virtuoso Jasser Haj Youssef composes the music and performs it live on stage, joined by Moroccan singer Mohammed El Arabi-Serghini and Lebanese singer Fadia Tomb El Hage.
The set is by visual artist Amine Amharech, who creates sensory spaces in which Moroccan influences can be felt. The costumes are designed by fashion designer Amine Bendriouich, who releases traditional Berber clothing from fixed norms around gender and identity. In this fusion of dance, music, image and costume, a performance emerges about destruction and rebirth, about what disappears and what continues to resonate.
International Dance Fund (FIND)
This performance is presented by Amare and Holland Dance Festival and is part of the International Dance Fund (FIND). Through this fund, Amare, Holland Dance Festival and Nederlands Dans Theater join forces to bring high-profile international dance productions to The Hague and present them at Amare. Read more about the International Dance Fund here.
Cloakroom and drink
Cloakroom and an intermission drink are included. If the event does not have an intermission, you will receive the drink afterwards.
