🩶 COMING OCTOBER 17th 🩶
Resting Voices: A Library in Pieces
Resting Voices: A Library in Pieces is an oral library that can be experienced lying down. It takes the form of a series of listening sessions, or an installation designed to travel into libraries, 4 Pillow Books.
🩶 Tanzquartier Wien 🩶
Listening sessions: October 17th and December 4th
Pillow books installation: October 19th to December 12th, during the opening hours of Tanzquartier Wien
By Alix Eynaudi in collaboration with Paul Kotal (sound design, audio editorial design), Julia Müllner (editor, publication design) and Luis Pisetta Ravanelli (editor, webpage programmer)
Funded by La Manufacture, Haute école des arts de la scène – HES-SO Lausanne, and supported by Tanzquartier Wien 🩶

RESEARCH QUESTIONS

What concepts and practices of rest can we mobilise, that do not simply relapse into the choreographies of neoliberal productivity?

What corpo-realities, what movement sensibilities, what discursive practices, what (hi)stories, what (meta)physics, what forms of assembly do we need to rehearse, to resist in the kineticist societies of control and self(ie)-performance we live in?

How to rehearse forms of disengagement from everything that, in our daily forms of living and relating, working and instituting, continues to reinstate cycles of violence, oppression, exhaustion?

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Institute of Rest(s): How to trouble productivity through dance and its spaces of communality

Research-based pedagogical and collective study platform funded by La Manufacture – Haute école des arts de la scène (HES-SO), Lausanne (CH) (2023–2025)

This large-scale research project interrogates the notions of rest, the remains, and modes of communal study within the context of contemporary choreographic practice. It frames rest not only as a conceptual object but as an investigative and methodological stance, prioritising indeterminacy, incompletion, and interruption over representational production and evaluative critique — with the aim of troubling productivity in an age of performance. The project articulates rest(s) alongside collective study and expanded choreography, combining sensuous situated knowledge from dance and performance studies, poetry, philosophy of language, and experimental writing.

Team

• Alix Eynaudi – choreographic artist, dancer, and researcher in performing arts (Principal Researcher)
• Paula Caspão – artist, writer, and researcher (Centre for Theatre Studies, University of Lisbon)
  Additional invited researchers and contributors: Cécile Tonizzo (visual artist and researcher), Catol Teixeira de Oliveira (choreographic artist), Geoffroy Solelhac (sleep research / CHUV Lausanne), Barbara Manzetti (choreographer / researcher), Anne Faucheret (art historian & professor), Anne Juren (choreographer / Feldenkrais practitioner), Nicole Suzuki (editor / Kunsthalle Wien), Clementine Burnley (poet / mediator), Emma Bigé (artist / writer / translator), Yves Mettler (visual artist), Shivangi Mariam Raj (theoretical writer), Jason Dodge (artist & publisher of fivehundredplaces), Ujjwal Kanishka Utkarsh (filmmaker), Andrea Ancira (editor & curator) and others.
• Auguste de Boursetty – choreographic artist (Assistant Researcher)

Institutional Partners & Support
funded by La Manufacture — Haute école des arts de la scène (HES-SO Lausanne) supported by Tanzfabrik Berlin, Tanzquartier Wien, ImPulsTanz Vienna, Xing Bologna, Centro de Estudos de Teatro Lisbon, La Grange – Centre / Arts et Sciences (UNIL Lausanne), far° fabrique des arts vivants Nyon, Volkskundemuseum Wien, production support by boite de production – Verein für zeitgenössischen Tanz und zeitgenössische Installationen.

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Public Activities

Poetry Without Poets #1 – Choreo-somatics of Resting Dissidence
Date: March 2023
Location: Tanzquartier Wien
Participants: Paula Caspão, Cécile Tonizzo, Sabina Holzer, Ujjwal Kanishka Utkarsh, Alix Eynaudi, Quim Pujol, Joachim Hamou, Ari Ban
Format: Collective reading-sleeping and writing session
Outcome: Giant notebook – a processual score for writing-napping

Poetry Without Poets #2 – Choreo-somatics of Resting Dissidence
Date: October 2023
Location: Forum Dança, Lisbon
Participants: Nina Pertsov, Joachim Hamou, Paula Caspão, Cécile Tonizzo, Jérôme Dupraz, Alix Eynaudi
Format: Collective reading-sleeping and writing session
Outcome: Giant notebook

Restshops
practical workshops exploring rest, poetic refusal, haunted scores, and choreolinguistic care.

(Im)Mobility Salons
public readings / collective study sessions

(Im)Mobility Salon #1: Institute of Rest(s) Meets Tanzfabrik
Date: March 2024
Location: Berlin
Participants: Paula Caspão, Emma Bigé, Ujjwal Kanishka Utkarsh, Yves Mettler, Clementine Burnley
Format: Four-day collective public study salon

(Im)Mobility Salon #2: Institute of Rest(s) Meets La Grange / UNIL
Date: April 2024
In the shadow of: The Soft Brain of Existence by Collectif Foulles
Participants: Paula Caspão, Cécile Tonizzo, Barbara Manzetti, Les Médusales

(Im)Mobility Salon #3: Institute of Rest(s) Meets Volkskundemuseum Wien
Date: June 2024
Participants: Shivangi Mariam Raj / The Funambulist, Andrea Ancira / Tumbalacasa, Ujjwal Kanishka Utkarsh, Jaba Devdariani / Civil Georgia, Jason Dodge / fivehundred places, Raimundas Malašauskas, Mette Edvardsen & Jeroen Peeters / Varamo Press, Nicole Suzuki, Paula Caspão

(Im)Mobility Salon #4: Institute of Rest(s) Meets Xing Bologna
Date: December 2024
Location: Raum Bologna, by invitation of Xing
Participants: Alix Eynaudi, Paul Kotal, Anne Faucheret, Zoe Francia Lamattina, Ida Malfatti, Cécile Tonizzo, Daniela Crocetti

Insomnia
A Dance to Under-Grow
Date: August 2024
Location: far° festival, Nyon
Guests: Cécile Tonizzo, Myriam Lefkowitz, Dr. Geoffroy Solelhac (CIRS – Sleep Research Center)

Nap-Conferences
reading-sleeping sessions and hallucinatory remediation. by Alix Eynaudi & Paula Caspão

HAUNTED NAP [left there / planted there]
Location: La Manufacture (Switzerland)
Date: April 29, 2025

HAUNTED NAP [left there / planted there]
Location: 16th International SAR Conference on Artistic Research, Faculty of Engineering, University of Porto
Date: May 9, 2025

HAUNTED NAP [left there / planted there]
Location: Performance Studies International PSI #30, Federal University of Ceará, Fortaleza
Date: December 5, 2025

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Research Framing & Methodology
The project’s conceptual stance emphasises collective practices of resting, slowing, dwelling, and reading/writing together, situating rest as a choreographic study practice that challenges neoliberal productivity and dominant paradigms of performance. It builds on a research ecology that values collective choreographic inquiry, translation, and indeterminacy as ways of navigating and resisting pervasive performance cultures.

Selected Shared Outcomes – Contributions to collective salons, walk-throughs, translation groups, and public research encounters as part of the project’s shared pedagogical practice.
Collaborative article by Alix Eynaudi and Paula Caspão, “cela ne va pas sans dire” (Journal de la recherche, March 2025)

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Institute of Rest(s)

A project by Alix Eynaudi together with co-investigator Paula Caspão
Funded by: La Manufacture, Haute école des arts de la scène – HES-SO
In partnership with institutional partners: Tanzquartier Wien; far° fabrique des arts vivants Nyon; La Grange – Centre / Arts et Sciences / UNIL Lausanne; Xing Bologna / Raum Bologna; Centro de Estudos de Teatro, Faculdade de Letras da Universidade de Lisboa
Assistant Researcher: Auguste de Boursetty

Inviting Institutions & Hosting Partners

Critical Dramaturgy, Zagreb (Restshop)
École supérieure d’art et de design Marseille-Méditerranée (Restshop)
far° fabrique des arts vivants Nyon (Insomnia)
Federal University of Ceará, Fortaleza (Haunted Nap at PSI #30)
Forum Dança Lisbon (Poetry without Poets)
La Grange – Centre / Arts et Sciences / UNIL Lausanne ((Im)Mobility Salon)
ImPulsTanz Vienna (Restshops)
La Manufacture – HES-SO Lausanne (Restshops)
PETEC / Association for Theatre and Contemporary Dance Bucharest (Restshop)
Scene:Bluss (Restshop)
Tanzfabrik Berlin (Restshop & (Im)Mobility Salon)
University of Porto, Faculty of Engineering (Haunted Nap at the 16th International SAR Conference)
Volkskundemuseum Wien ((Im)Mobility Salon)
Wonderfruit Festival Thailand (Restshop)
Xing Bologna / Raum Bologna ((Im)Mobility Salon)

Guests

Andrea Ancira
Tumbalacasa – Transfeminist Editorial Practice, Translucinations, and Curatorial Research

Ari Ban
Visual Arts – Drawing, Somatic Gestures, and Spatial Traces

Emma Bigé
Philosophy & Translation – Queer Theory, Somatic Studies, and Contact Improvisation

An Breugelmans
Costume Design

Clementine Burnley
Poetry & Creative Facilitation – Diasporic Kinship, Trauma-Informed Collective Listening, and Intersectional Narrative Practices

Paula Caspão
Artistic Research, Philosophy & Theory-Fiction – Infra-Ordinary Dimensions of Reading and Textual Contaminations at the Centre for Theatre Studies, University of Lisbon. Co-weaver of Mouths Full, an unfinishing, phantasmagorical reading and video-audio practice initiated in 2019. Mouths Full directly explores the dialogue between two main research branches: Caspão’s own Expanded Practices All Over (CET-FLUL) and Alix Eynaudi’s Institute of Rest(s).

Daniela Crocetti
Medical Anthropology & Sociology – Variations of Sex Characteristics Research and Intersex Advocacy Alliances

Jaba Devdariani
Civil Georgia – Conflict Resolution, Independent Public Service Journalism, and Geopolitical Risk Analysis

Jason Dodge
fivehundred places – Poetic Publishing, Visual Arts, and Textual Dispersals

Jérôme Dupraz
Agriculture & Agroecology – Set Designer

Mette Edvardsen & Jeroen Peeters
Varamo Press – Experimental Literature, Performance Writing, and Independent Bookmaking

Anne Faucheret
Contemporary Art Curating – Critical Theory, Exhibition Dramaturgy, and Art History

Zoe Francia Lamattina
Performance Art – Vocal Ecology, Textual Inhabitations, and Somatic Movement

Joachim Hamou
Visual Arts, Filmmaking & Independent Publishing – Transdisciplinary Working Economies, Political Dramaturgy, and Collaborative Projects with Paraguay / Paraguay Press and castillo/corrales

Sabina Holzer
Choreography & Performance Writing – Somatic Inquiry, Poetics, and Ecocritical Movement Studies

Myriam Lefkowitz
Performance & Choreography – Perceptive Experiential Practices and Sensorial Environments

Raimundas Malašauskas
Independent Curatorial Practice – Conceptual Interventions, Hypnotic Formats, and Fleeting Structures

Ida Malfatti
Performance & Textual Experimentation – Artistic Research and Fluid Writing Formats

Barbara Manzetti
Writing & Performance – Textual Deviations, Loitering, and the Choral Polyphonies of Rester. Étranger, an Exile Family and Living Collective Testing the Hospitality of Language

Les Médusales collectif
Les Médusales – Decolonial Resource Space & Radiophonic Archives for Under-Exposed Narratives

Yves Mettler
Visual Arts & Urbanism – Spatial Choreographies, Plaza Studies, and Community Architecture

Nina Pertsov
Artistic Research – Performance Formats, Somatic Interventions, and Contextual Practice

Quim Pujol
Poetry & Performance – Philosophy of Language, Conceptual Disruption, and Independent Curating at the Sâlmon Live Arts Festival in Barcelona

Shivangi Mariam Raj
The Funambulist – Poetry, Political Architecture, Decolonial Thought, and the Critical Geographies of Public Remembering

Geoffroy Solelhac
CIRS – Sleep Research Center

Nicole Suzuki
Zaglossus / Critical Theory – Queer-Feminist Publishing Platforms and Intersectional Textual Alliances

Catol Teixeira
Dance & Choreography – Somatic Fluidity, Decolonial Performance, and Corporeal Shifting

Cécile Tonizzo
Visual Arts & Set Design – Soft Architectures, Material Transformations, and Intimate Scenographies

Ujjwal Kanishka Utkarsh
Filmmaking & Visual Anthropology – Recorded Memory, Archival Gaps, and Slow-Cinema Textures