Product of Circumstances

Xavier Le Roy

18/12/2025, 07.00 PM

Performance

Circumstances: "I began to take two dance classes a week at the same time that I started to work on my thesis for my Ph.D. in molecular and cellular biology. It’s been now eight years that I have submitted my thesis and stopped to work as a biologist. Since I work as a dancer or choreograph I am very often presented as an atypical dancer or as a dancer molecular biologist. It became my currency in the "Society of the Spectacle". I was invited to prepare and present a lecture for an event on theory and praxis in performance ("Body currency" Wiener Festwochen June ‘98)..."

Product: Biography as theory. An autobiographical conference becoming a performance. My body as raw material of social and cultural organization and as the practice of critical necessity.

Xavier Le Roy holds a PhD in molecular biology from the University of Montpellier, France, and has been working as an artist since 1991. Since 2018, he has been a professor at the Institute for Applied Theater Studies in Giessen, Germany. 
He has been artist-in-residence at Berlin's Podewil (1996-2003), associate artist at the Centre Chorégraphique National de Montpellier (2007-2008), artist-in-residence at the MIT Program in Art Culture and Technology (Cambridge, MA) (2010), and at the Théâtre de la Cité Internationale, Paris (2012-2015). With solo works such as Self Unfinished (1998), Product of Circumstances (1999) and Le sacre du printemps (2007), he has opened up new perspectives in choreography. 
His works are experimental, motivated by the need for transformation, questions about the notion of movement and what it produces. They are guided by the desire to alter our understanding of dichotomies such as: Human/Non-Human, Subject/Object, Passive/Active, Norma/Anormal, ...., and to multiply our perspectives.
His latest works, such as: Still (life) In Taipei (2022), Still In Hong Kong (2021), Still Untitled (2017), For the Unfaithful Replica (2016) and Temporary Title, 2015,   in collaboration with Scarlet Yu, or We Are Not Monsters (2020) in collaboration with Dalibor Šandor and Per.Art, followed works such as Untitled (2012) and Retrospective (2012-)  which use and investigate the time, the space as well as the relationships between the public and live artworks made possible by exhibitions, museums and other public spaces.
His work has been presented internationally, including at the Taipei Performing Arts Center, Skulptur Projekte Münster 2017, Taikwun Contemporary Art Center (Hong Kong), Tapiès Foundation (Barcelona), MoMA PS1 - New York, Kaldor Public Art Projects (Sydney), Centre Pompidou (Paris) and La Biennale di Venezia Danza, Taipei Biennale, Kaldor Public Art Project among others.