Mélanie Demers

Mélanie Demers studied dance, theatre and literature in Quebec City before returning to her home town of Montreal. After completing her studies at LADMMI  in 1996, she created her first choreography, Les oubliettes, and collaborated with  various choreographers including Danièle Desnoyers and Ginette Laurin. For close  to eight years she danced with O Vertigo, resigning in 2006 to pursue her own projects. She founded Mayday in 2007, leaving behind the playful theatricality of her younger work for an approach with a focus on observing the human condition  and questioning the role of the artist in society.

In a world that she believes to be on the verge of collapse, Mélanie Demers considers being an artist a privilege, and aims to create work that mingles politics  and poetry and stimulates debate. The first two pieces produced by her company  Mayday, Les angles morts and Sauver sa peau, this last one co-created in 2008 with  the choreographer Laïla Diallo, are marked by dramatic power and surrealist  iconography. While the stage was full of costumes and props in her 2010 piece Junkyard/Paradis, she has adopted a bare bones style for Goodbye. Mélanie  Demers is also involved in various social action projects in Haiti, Kenya and Brazil.