ribcage: this wide passage

written and performed by Heather Hermant

Dramaturgy/Direction: Diane Roberts
Composer/Musician & Sound design: Jaron Freeman-Fox
Videography: Melina Young
Costume Design: Luisa Milan
Video Mixing: Kaija Siirala

At Montreal Arts Interculturel (Le MAI)
October 28th-30th 2010

In September 1738, Esther Brandeau appeared before colonial authorities at Quebec City, an outed female, and an outed Jew. Who outed her on either count, and how, remains in question. There she recounted events that had led to her setting sail for New France as Jacques LaFargue, a Christian boy who had lived for five years as a male labourer, working as an apprentice in various trades under various male identities, on sea and on land, across France and beyond. Born into a Jewish community in French Basque country that traced its roots to forced conversions and exile during the Inquisitions in Spain and Portugal, Brandeau/LaFargue is said to be among the first, if not the first Jewish person to set foot in what is now known as Canada.

ribcage is a multilingual performance unveiled within a series of lush and haunting video installations and live performance. It is a bold and consequently little-known Canadian foundation tale. This original production includes Heather Hermants painstaking search in archival records in Canada and in Europe. The story walks us, as Heather literally did, through locales named in archives in Quebec and in France, follows on foot a history from Portugal through Spain to France.

Listen to Tara Lee’s CBC North by Northwest Interview with ribcage artists Heather Hermant, Diane Roberts and Jaron Freeman-Fox

– What people are saying about ribcage:    this wide passage:

Gita Hashemi, Visual and Digital Media Artist, Toronto:
The emotional weight. The burden of displacement. A multiplicity of crossings. ribcage hit me in my core… Very very powerful.

Jill Carter, Playwright/Actor,Toronto:
Heather has done something very rare here. She has created a strange alchemy. She invokes another presence and plays with it. She ushers us and herself into the story and then suddenly she becomes interwoven with the digital. The story begins to inscribe itself on her body as she’s inscribing. The floor suddenly becomes vast to the point where you feel that little bit of fear that you’re on the edge of the world.

Monique Mojica, Playwright/Actor, Toronto:
Commitment. Courage. Heart. “There is no resolution,” says Heather in ribcage:   this wide passage and I was aware of the responsibility that she feels in telling this story. I want other people out there in the world to feel it like shes feels it. Seeing the archive tattooed on her body, the energy and meaning of that, and the relationship of the movement to language is strong, so effective, so important..

View Slideshow from Toronto Workshop Showcase Feb 2010