Béatrice Balcou was selected for a residency in Japan in 2009. She then presented Computer Performance at artconnexion on 1 June 2010.

"My artistic approach revolves around the study of gesture. In my latest work, I have been trying to show gestures that we don't pay attention to. These gestures - which at first sight are invisible - these little body and language tics which accompany our way of being, without us usually taking them into account. Each time, I start from a concrete situation and try to make the gesture more visible.

Having read and heard accounts of the specificity of Japanese gestures, I asked artconnexion if they would enable me to carry out a research trip to Japan in order to enrich this artistic reflection on gesture and to begin a mainly performative work. Indeed, artconnexion established contacts with the Kuki group of performers based in Kobe and particularly with Horio Sadaharu, from the Gutai group. artconnexion then invited me to spend three weeks in Kobe with this group of performers and I then continued the rest of my residency in Tokyo.

I left with the intention of gathering information on Japanese gestures and with the desire to confront my own performance process with that of this group called Kuki."

Extract from Béatrice Balcou report, 2009