Gounouj - Le Cargo

Gounouj, a contemporary dance tableau by the Zimarèl company and choreographer Léo Lérus, on Friday 9 January 2025 at 8.30pm at the Cargo.

Initially trained as a dancer on his native island of Guadeloupe, Léo Lérus went on to perform for major international companies before creating his own works.

Gounouj in Creole means 'frog'. When night falls, it's a veritable symphony. Léo Lérus hears them croaking on a protected site by the Caribbean Sea. But for how much longer? The premonition that these landscapes and species may one day disappear forms the beautifully melancholy baseline of Gounouj. It's a question that the choreographer deals with physically and emotionally, and leaves open, listening to the orders and disorders of the world and the vulnerabilities of the human being.

While Gounouj bears the DNA of Léo Lérus's native land, the dancers, like him, are rich in mixed cultures. Their dance is inspired by amphibian movements, the forest and the mangrove.

The dancers have immersed themselves in these marshy landscapes, but also in the particular motor skills of the gounouj, with their way of stretching their thighs and leaping 25 times the length of their bodies.