Olivia Ruiz celebrates exiles with strength and dignity

At the Théâtre des Bouffes du Nord where, at the end of 2021, she presents Sewn mouths, Olivia Ruiz emerges from the back of the room. From the first verses sung in Spanish, his voice enlightens us. A spark of happiness, after the long months of confinement and abstruse instructions.

In this work, the poetess of word, sound and gesture speaks of her ancestors forced into exile by Francoism, of the Spanish republicans, she speaks of herself, of us, of today’s exiles, faced with the abject repetitiveness of history. On the wall at the back of the stage, Michel Campiche’s sentence stands out: “Silence is the refuge of freedom. »

The resonance of scenes of exile

“Three of my grandparents had to flee Spain and settle in a France for which they were undesirables, remembers the native of Carcassonne. At home, we didn’t speak Spanish, we never talked about our roots. »

But, in this artist of heart and conscience, the germ of memory has found fertile ground to flourish and celebrate with strength and dignity the uprooted, as evidenced by Sewn mouths. Popular songs that have become anthems alternate with Olivia Ruiz’s hits – Unsaid, I drag my feet, What date…

And, little by little, a deep link is woven between the intimate and the great story. Thereby, El Ejercito Del Ebro (the Army of the Ebro), protest song born during the war of independence and revived during the civil war, unfolds with solemnity through the voice of the charismatic performer and the music that unfolds like a march vibrating with gravity.

Jérémie Lippmann’s scenography combines, with as much thoughtfulness as ingenuity, projections of visual creations, quotations (Pablo Neruda, Boris Cyrulnik, etc.) and extracts from the archives (from the INA and the Institut Jean -Vigo).

Images show, here, an impressive line of men, rifle in hand, crossing the countryside or, there, women and children thrown on the roads with their meager luggage. These scenes of yesterday’s exile resonate with current events that are pushing millions of human beings to exodus. Emotion…

The body rebels or exults

The singer with multiple distinctions radiates light with words and melodies, which she carries in osmosis with her musical companions. Vincent David (guitar, ukulele), David Hadjadj (keyboards, trumpet, trombone), Mathieu Denis (bass, double bass) and Franck Marty playing unusual instruments (Swedish nyckelharpa, Andean charango, etc.) create universes that open wide the imaginary. And, when the humble diva begins to dance, it is the movement of the body that speaks, rebels or exults.

Sewn mouths, a spectacle of pregnant plenitude, appeals to all our senses, feeds our thoughts, irrigates our desire for utopia. He takes the public on a liberating poetic peregrination that is acclaimed, at the end, by waves of cheers.