the body symphonic & Mouton Noir (Black Sheep)

Charlie Khalil Prince & Amadou Diop - Company Ngor

Split image showing two performers on a dark stage. On the left, a bearded man stands in profile holding a microphone aloft with one arm extended above his head. On the right, a smiling performer in an oversized dark suit crouches low with both hands on the floor. Both figures are isolated against a black background and lit by stage lighting.
Photos by Giuseppe Follachio and Zilla

About the body symphonic & Mouton Noir (Black Sheep)

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A powerful double-bill from two internationally-acclaimed dance artists, performing solo works in the UK for the first time

Created in response to the multiple political and geopolitical crises in Lebanon, the body symphonic is a meditation on the body’s place in the struggle against occupation. Lebanese dancer, choreographer and musician Charlie Khalil Prince transforms the stage into a space of resistance in a magnetic solo performance, where the body asserts its agency against erasure. At once a concert and a choreographic offering, the work blurs the line between dance and music; gestures generate sound, while rhythms from virtuoso percussionist Joss Turnbull give rise to movement. Prince draws from both contemporary and folk dances, allowing traditions to fracture and reconfigure into new mythologies. It is a meditation, a purge, a prayer, invoking the possibility of imagined futures.

Mouton Noir (Black Sheep) is a solo dance piece exploring the tension between individuality and conformity in a norm-driven society, told through Senegalese dancer Amadou Diop's signature blend of contemporary dance and hip-hop. Using the symbolic figure of the “black sheep,” Diop questions the place of those who refuse to follow the herd, risking exclusion while asserting the freedom to be. Moving between vulnerability and strength, it transforms pain into a vital force and a singular voice.

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A visual and sonic jolt which left the public both breathless and in admiration

La Depêche, on the body symphonic

About Charlie Khalil Prince

Charlie Khalil Prince is a Lebanese dancer, choreographer, and musician whose work merges movement, sound, and political consciousness into transcendent performance. His practice explores the body as site, symbol, and archive, positioning vulnerability as rebellion, and performance as a space of memory, resistance, and renewal. Blending music and movement into one living gesture, he transforms the body into both vessel and witness, navigating between mourning and visionary futures that resist cultural subjugation.

Prince’s choreographic work has been presented internationally at FTA - Festival TransAmèriques, ImPulsTanz, Dansmakers Amsterdam, Les Rencontres chorégraphiques internationales de Seine-Saint-Denis and the Vancouver International Dance Festival among others, and the Beirut International Platform of Dance. In 2023, he was artist-in-residence at the Villa Empain in Brussels, where he received the Boghossian Foundation award for dance and performance. He was selected as one of the Aerowaves 25 Artists with his solo work the body symphonic. For Prince, dance is essential: an insistence on life, memory, and resistance in times of crisis.

www.charlie-prince.info

the body symphonic Cast & Creatives

Choreography & Performance: Charlie Khalil Prince

Live Music: Charlie Khalil Prince and JossTurnbull

With samples and recordings from the voice of MouneerSaeed, from Mustafa Said’s Into The Silent Zoneفي رحاب الضمت and of an excerpt from Sextantby Stellar Banger

Dramaturgy: Erin Hill

Light Design: Joe Levasseur

About Amadou Diop

Amadou Diop is a Senegalese dancer, choreographer and performer emerging from the contemporary dance scene in Senegal and West Africa. Rooted in urban dance styles — popping, locking and breakdance — he has developed a hybrid physical language, enriched by his training in traditional African dance at École des Sables, where he was introduced to the Acogny technique and contemporary dance.

At the crossroads of urban and African contemporary aesthetics, his artistic work explores human dignity and social issues. Founder of Compagnie Ngor, he created his first solo piece Black Sheep, supported by several international cultural partners and presented at the African Dance Biennale in Senegal (2026).

Mouton Noir (Black Sheep) Cast & Creatives

Choreography & Performance: Amadou Diop

Artistic Sound Design: Amadou Diop & Index Nuul Kuuk

Costumes: Tandem

Production: Sarah Maupin (Company Ngor)

Mouton Noir (Black Sheep) Credits

Supported by Zhu Culture, French Institute of Senegal in Saint-Louis, Villa Saint-Louis Ndar, École des Sables, Le Château Cultural Center, Alliance Française of Banjul, Centre National de la Danse

  • A performer stands shirtless under a spotlight on a dark stage, their body angled to one side with arms extended in a sculptural pose. The lighting highlights the contours of their torso while the surrounding space remains in shadow.
  • A performer balances low to the floor under a spotlight, supporting themself with one hand while leaning to the side. Their bare torso and dark trousers are illuminated against the dark stage. Audience members are visible in silhouette in the foreground, watching from the edge of the performance space.