Hortense Belhôte

Performed by Aurélien Patouillard, Auréliens is the stage transposition of a lecture that Aurélien Barrau gave in 2019 at the University of Lausanne on what he calls ‘The greatest challenge in the history of humanity’. While, like his peers, Aurélien Barrau draws up an implacable balance sheet, he also puts forward a dozen or so avenues for us to consider in an attempt - if not to avoid a wall from which every minute of inaction that passes brings us closer - to limit the damage. Auréliens' ambition, by shifting both the discourse (from a “traditional” audience to a theatre) and its transmitter (from the author to the “character”), is to revisit the sensitive dimension of discourse, based on the conviction that the so-called “living” arts can convey just how fragile and precious the act of being remains.

The founding of the Kronenbourg brewery in Strasbourg; the sentencing to life imprisonment of Nicolas Fouquet, the former initiator of festivities uniting all the arts at his estate of Vaux-le-Vicomte; the advent of Louis Quatorzian absolutism; Colbert's creation of the Compagnie des Indes, the future ‘dealer’ in coffee, tobacco, rum, sugar and opium... What do these events have in common? They all took place in 1664 and marked a reversal of perspective, both aesthetic and political: from liberating celebration to political propaganda, from the symphony of the arts to the sclerosis of the academies, from intoxication to addiction. Hortense Belhôte's revitalising lecture, which combines erudition, committed discourse and personal recollections, brings the Baroque spirit up to date.

The origins of this piece, written, directed and performed by Thomas Quillardet, stem from the experience of an immersion period in a hospital addiction unit. Lasting six months, this residency, made possible by the Festival d’Automne within the framework of its 'Assistance publique – Hôpitaux de Paris. What form of spoken word circulates in this encounter between individuals trying to wean themselves off their various forms of addiction, over-worked hospital staff and a theatre director? In a polyphony of voices, carried along by a finely-tuned sense of rhythm, En addicto unravels stories and life histories, as well as moments of joy and emptiness. It also examines, in a documentary-style way, the institution of the hospital itself, addiction and its treatment. The same question arises: how can we ease pain?