Jean-Baptiste André

Jean-Baptiste André was born in Reims in 1979. After several years training and competing in gymnastics, he discovered the circus arts. This discipline also introduced him to theater and dance. He spent a year studying literature before joining the Centre National des Arts du Cirque in Châlons-en-Champagne, where he specialized in hand balancing and clowning.
After graduating in 2002, he founded the W association and created several shows: Intérieur nuit (2004), Comme en plein jour (2006), Qu'après en être revenu (2010). He has also developed a number of small forms, called Modules, which he conceives as experimental spaces.
Winner of the Villa Médicis Hors Les Murs program, he travelled to Japan and created Faces Cachées / Kakusareta Men with two Japanese artists (2005).

With author Fabrice Melquiot, he co-wrote the plays S'enfuir (2011), and L'espace which premiered as part of the Concordan(s)e festival in Paris in 2012.

In 2013, he co-wrote the piece Pleurage et scintillement with balancing dancer Julia Christ.

The following year, in 2014, he and author Eddy Pallaro created Millefeuille, a show combining theater and movement through the practice of balancing. Millefeuille is intended exclusively for high school students, and is performed in schools.
He is currently working with visual artist Vincent Lamouroux on Floe (2016), a piece designed for the public space.
Alongside the development of his projects and the W association, he is enriched by contact with other choreographers and directors with whom he works: Philippe Découflé, Gilles Baron, Christian Rizzo, Herman Diephuis, François Verret, Arnaud Meunier, Rachid Ouramdane, Perrine Valli, Yoann Bourgeois.
He also collaborates with artists from other disciplines, working regularly with South African visual artist Robin Rhode.
He is called on to work on outside projects as an outsider, and is involved in workshops.
The W association is based in Brittany. It receives support for its projects from the City of Rennes and the Brittany Region.