As seen in Asheville Citizen Times | Scene, Friday, April 25, 2025
Most professional dancers — especially those who go on to found successful companies — begin their training in childhood. Gaspard Louis isn’t like most professional dancers.
For the Haitian-born choreographer, dance began in a college gymnasium, where Louis, then a business major in the martial arts club, was leading a self-defense demonstration for other students. After the exercise, a dance major approached him to ask if he’d be part of her senior project. She was having trouble finding a male dancer for her piece, and based on Louis’s footwork and strength, she likely figured he was her next best bet.
Louis had never taken a dance class in his life — but she was persuasive, and he was intrigued. “She was cute and gave me her number,” he said, laughing. So he showed up to rehearsal, found surprising parallels between martial arts and movement, and was hooked. “I fell in love with it,” he said. “So I said, what the heck, let me just become a dance major.”
That leap of faith marked the beginning of a career that would take Louis from Montclair State University to the prestigious, world-renowned dance company Pilobolus, and eventually to founding his own company, Gaspard&Dancers. On May 2 and 3, his company brings a vibrant, emotionally resonant program to Asheville, featuring a collection of shorter works — each one distinct, yet all deeply personal.
“My creative process is very similar to Pilobolus,” Louis explained, “because [the founders of Pilobolus] weren’t originally highly trained dancers, either. They stumbled into dance the same way. So, our way of thinking is different. Our whole approach to choreography is different than your normal, classically trained dancers.”
The evening opens with “Tota Pulchra Es” (Latin for “You Are All Beautiful”), a dreamlike piece inspired by holiday window displays in New York. “I’m passing by all these department store windows with beautifully dressed mannequins, and I start thinking they look so much like people,” Louis said. “They are people, in a way. What would happen if we breathed life into them?”
Similarly imaginative is Louis’s latest piece, “Suite Linda,” also part of the Asheville program. Commissioned by a member of Gaspard&Dancers’ board in celebration of her 60th birthday, the piece draws directly from conversations Louis had with her and her husband, using their answers to questions about love, frustration and devotion to create a vocabulary of movement.
“The piece is an abstract interpretation of conversations that I had with her and her husband about who they are to each other, their relationships, their family,” the choreographer said. “It’s a bit like a celebration of the ups and downs in every relationship — how we go about fixing our issues, solving whatever problems may occur and, ultimately, the fact that we stay together is a testament of the strength of that relationship.” “Suite Linda” also draws inspiration from the paintings of abstract artist Trevor Bell.
But how does one translate interview responses and paintings — or storefront mannequin displays — into dance?
“It’s all a collaboration with my dancers,” Louis said. “I give them a lot of prompts, and together we figure out where the puzzle pieces fit. You can look at a painting and say: ‘OK. These lines are running from left to right and ending up in a circular pattern. Or maybe the painting makes you feel a certain way. Or the colors of this shape have ties to deep emotions, like red being symbolic for rage. And that’s what makes it so fun, because we’re using our imaginations to tell the story in my head.”
Another work on the Asheville program may resonate with more meaning in the aftermath of Hurricane Helene’s destruction across the region. Part of the trilogy Louis created in response to the 2010 earthquake in Haiti, “L’Esprit” is not about the tragedy itself, but about the resilience that follows. “It’s a celebration of life,” Louis said. “A town coming back to life. People going about their day, picking up the pieces, rebuilding. It’s dedicated to everyone who’s experienced a natural disaster — that our spirits remain alive.”
Similarly, “(a)Part” was created in response to the isolation of the COVID-19 pandemic. It explores the tension between physical separation and the longing for connection. Like many of Louis’ works, it invites audiences not to decode a narrative, but to feel it.
“I create things for the heart and try not to worry too much about the head,” Louis said. “Because once you capture somebody’s heart, the head will follow. I don’t ever want to create a piece that’s so heady that people walk out and wonder: ‘What was that all about?’ I want to create pieces that are for everyone — so that people will leave the theater feeling excited and passionate and joyful.”
WANT TO GO?
What: Gaspard&Dancers
When: 8 p.m. Friday, May 2 and Saturday, May 3
Where: Diana Wortham Theatre at the Wortham Center, 18 Biltmore Ave., downtown Asheville
Tickets: $65; $15 ARTS RISING! tickets available
