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  • BSK & YBDG

    Spotlight on a Collaborative Performance at Dover Street Market Paris

On October 15th and 17th, the new location of the international chain Dover Street Market Paris hosted an unprecedented performance born from the collaboration between the Mexican artist Bárbara Sánchez-Kane and the collective Young Boy Dancing Group. Art, sculpture, choreography, sound composition, and fashion became expressive channels for a multi-themed representation that leads the audience to a state of provocation and reflection. The contrasts of a society marked by taboos are brought to the surface and explored with a dark, provocative, and identity-driven approach.

In Paris, Art Week took place, and around the central nucleus of Art Basel, a true ecosystem developed, comprising cultural initiatives and exhibitions scattered throughout the city. Galleries, shops, cultural centres, and universities hosted independent exhibitions, transforming into temporary artistic spaces. Among the various entities involved, Dover Street Market Paris also contributed, consolidating its new presence in the French capital.

The renowned international chain, created by Rei Kawakubo of Comme des Garçons, recently opened its Parisian location, which quickly established itself as a prolific cultural hub—a meeting place for artists, performers, and creatives of all kinds. The space symbolises interaction across different sectors, both through the events and collaborations it promotes and through its aesthetic and structural vision. The venue, in fact, includes both a retail area and a sterile gallery space designated for cultural initiatives.

In this context, an unprecedented collaboration found its home between Mexican artist and fashion designer Bárbara Sánchez-Kane and the experimental dance group Young Boy Dancing Group, presented on 15 and 17 October.

The fusion of these two worlds that of the artist and designer with the Zurich-based collective’s experimental choreography resulted in a performance with a macabre and resolute flavour, accompanied by the creation of a sculptural installation, a “burned altar.”

The performance, set to music by Darío Acuña and inspired by A Season in Hell, a work by French poet Arthur Rimbaud, featured six dancers who, interacting with the spectators around the altar, placed them in a state of full participation and emotional stimulation. The entire scene evoked a ritualistic and macabre aesthetic, used, however, to critique heteronormative society. Love and hate, fetishism and obsession, separation and unity… The artist’s dystopian and metamorphic sculptures were used as props for the ritualistic choreography and as tools necessary for shaping hybrid bodies.

The group’s aim is to express an open and experimental language through performances, videos, and installations. At the core of their artistry lies free expression, embodied by key elements such as nudity, sexualisation, and transformation.

This concept is evident in every detail of the performance, not only in the movements but also in the stylistic choices. Leather and hide, used extensively in costumes and sculpture, refer to themes of bondage and provocation, but also of restriction and rebellion, while raw, worn materials taken from the streets find new life and meaning in this context. What society discards or ignores is here collected and recontextualised to create a new form of expression.

In this instance, fashion is not merely aesthetic but serves as an expressive tool and a component of the performance itself. The disturbing and provocative dimension of the representation provokes strong reactions, highlighting the weight of a social reality in which gender disparities and resistance to issues such as nudity, sexuality, and identity still exist.

BSK & YBDG / Dover Street Market Paris

Credits:

Artist: Bárbara Sánchez-Kane / @sanchez_kane  Kurimanzutto / @kurimanzutto
Collective Group: Young Boy Dancing Group / @ybdg_4
Music: Darío Acuña / @darioafb
Venue: Dover Street Market Paris / @doverstreetmarketparis
Photos by: Oriane Robaldo / @oriane.robaldo
Words: Annalisa Fabbrucci / @annalisa_fabbrucci
Editor: Maria Abramenko / @mariabramenko

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