Accumulation V, 1980
Documentation of the choreography for five dancers and five cars
Unknown photographer
Françoise Sullivan’s personal papers
Accumulation V, 1980
Choreography for 5 dancers and 5 automobiles, objects, sound
Parking lot in Old Montreal
Documentation. Françoise Sullivan’s personal papers
Executed in a parking lot in Old Montreal, the choreography Accumulation V started with a circular movement of five automobiles with radios tuned in to different stations. After driving around the lot in a ring three times, the cars stopped long enough to let out dancers, who in turn took up the circular movement. Eventually, only one car remained, making circles around the dancers for an hour and a half. As the dancers accumulated gestures between the centre and the circumference and turned around each other, they carried boxes on their heads, manoeuvring around suitcases, sacks and objects lying nearby on the ground, and headed toward a wall with an obstructed door. The choreography was based on an interplay of movement and circularity. By means of the circle, a predominant figure in Sullivan’s work, the artist established a connection between the inner and outer worlds.