Sidney Leoni (1984, Toulon, France) lives and works in Brussels & Stockholm as a choreographer, dancer-performer and filmmaker. His artistic research explores the field of immersive and experiential theatre and cinema, in which he focuses on the processes and effects of the audience's imaginary and sensory perceptions. With his performance projects Undertone (2010) and Hertz (2013), the theatre space is plunged in complete darkness, becoming the stage for the orchestration of sensory movements such as surround-soundscapes, live music, smells, vibrations, airflows and temperature fluctuations, in correlation to performative situations of encounter and mutual reliance between performers, musicians and audience members.
Sidney's latest projects - the fiction feature film I AM ALMOST NOT MAD (2022) and the film-performance FLY (2022, premiere at Moderna Museet, Stockholm) propose an intimate and very subjective portrait of perhaps one of the greatest dancers of the 20th century, Vaslav Nijinsky, Both works are based on the diary Nijinsky wrote in 1919, in which he reveals his sexual obsession and the horror of the First World War. He also bears witness to his entry into a then newly described psychosis: schizophrenia.
Sidney's first feature film Under Influence (2015, Hiros, premiere at Dansens Hus, Stockholm)) is a work of fiction that he also wrote, directed and produced, starring choreographers-performers Halla Ólafsdóttir and Christine de Smedt. The picture portrays the mysterious and psychotic journey of an actress during the shooting of a motion picture entitled 'Being Kate Winslet'.
In 2008-2009, Sidney took part in the master's programme Research in Choreography at Stockholm University of the Arts, and in 2002- 2006 he followed the bachelor's and master's programme Research in Dance at the Sophia Antipolis University in Nice. Before that, in 1990-1998, Sidney trained as a ballet dancer at the Toulon National Opera in France.
As a performer, Sidney has taken part in works by Mette Ingvartsen: Giant City (2009) and The Artificial Nature Project (2012), Andros Zins-Browne: The Host (2010) and Welcome to the Jungle (2012), and Stina Nyberg: Splendour (2015).