Dancing Through Life: Benoit Swan Pouffer On 100 Years Of Rambert

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Rambert brings works from its centenary programme, This Is Rambert, to Chelsea Arts Festival on 19 September

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Rambert is Britain’s first dance company to turn 100, but its artistic director Benoit Swan Pouffer is more interested in what comes next.

‘What is interesting about Rambert is that change is part of that history,’ says Pouffer, who has steered the ship since 2018. ‘The company has reinvented itself many times over the last century, moving with the world around it while holding onto a spirit of artistic ambition, curiosity and excellence.’ That restlessness roots back to Rambert’s founder, Marie Rambert, who in 1966 turned her classical ballet company contemporary to save it from financial stagnation, installing an ethos of experimentation that has trickled through every generation since.

Born and trained in Paris and based for most of his career in New York, Pouffer danced with Alvin Ailey before leading the American company Cedar Lake. ‘Alvin Ailey showed me that technical excellence and emotional truth could exist together, and also gave me an international perspective very early in my career,’ he says. ‘At Cedar Lake, I became very interested in artists who were redefining contemporary dance – people with an original voice who were prepared to challenge conventions.’

Benoit Swan Pouffer has steered Rambert as Artistic Director since 2018.

That same appetite for crossing disciplines has taken him from choreographing for FKA Twigs at Vogue World London to Paris Fashion Week runways. ‘I don’t see strict divisions between those different creative worlds,’ Pouffer says. ‘Whether I am working in dance, theatre, film, fashion or on a large-scale production, I am interested in many of the same things: storytelling, movement and emotional connection.’ That instinct, he believes, is part of what Rambert should be doing too: ‘I also believe very strongly that dance should be engaged with the wider culture around it. Music, fashion, politics, film, digital culture – these things are not separate from contemporary dance. They are part of the world our artists and our audiences are living in.’

Pouffer might be best known for Rambert’s adaptation of Peaky Blinders, which brought 250,000 people through the doors (60 per cent new to Rambert). ‘Peaky Blinders proved that you can reach a very broad audience without compromising on quality or ambition,’ he says. ‘You do not need to understand contemporary dance before you can experience it. You do not need to know its vocabulary or have seen it before. If something is powerful, physical and emotionally truthful, it can reach you. Part of our responsibility is to make extraordinary work, but also to keep finding ways for people who might never otherwise come to Rambert to encounter it.’

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The weighty follow-up, premiering in 2027, filters Russell T Davies’ hit HIV/AIDS drama It’s a Sin through Rambert’s language. ‘You are not only looking for ways to translate a brilliant piece of storytelling into movement. You are also asking how to honour what sits underneath it: the joy, the friendships, the freedom, but also the loss and the impact that period had on so many people,’ Pouffer says. ‘That feels especially close to Rambert. It is a story that touches communities who are part of the company, and there is a real sense of responsibility around how we tell it.’

That sense of responsibility extends to how far the work travels. Rambert runs the most extensive touring programme of any British contemporary dance company, and for Pouffer, reaching new audiences and taking creative risks are not in tension. ‘My own relationship with dance started that way – seeing Alvin Ailey on a VHS when I was 13 and feeling something before I had all the context for it,’ he says. ‘A company like this has to give artists space to experiment, to challenge the dancers and sometimes to create something unexpected.’

At Chelsea Arts Festival, that responsibility sits alongside something more exuberant: This is Rambert, a programme spanning the company’s different artistic voices across the century. ‘For me, looking forward is not about leaving the past behind,’ Pouffer says. ‘It is about recognising that innovation and reinvention are part of Rambert’s DNA. We honour what came before us by continuing to take risks, explore new possibilities and make work that speaks to audiences now.’

Rambert: This Is Rambert At Chelsea Arts Festival

Iconic and ever innovating dance company Rambert brings work from its centenary programme ‘This Is Rambert’ to Chelsea Arts Festival at Cadogan Hall, in honour of their centenary year.