Choreographer Cécile Proust and visual artist Jacques Hoepffner are working on an assignment from the French government to prepare New Year's Eve of 2000 on the Champs-Élysées in Paris and in the process, question the Millennium celebrations in reference to the rest of the world. This follows their recent research work regarding the space women have in the world.

For this particular piece, Cécile Proust and Jacques Hoepffner are travelling to different parts of the world to film the hands of women in activity in their daily life, at work or while creating. The hands will be shown at their work be it in the fields of agriculture, cooking, nursing, handicrafts, dance, drama, visual art or music or in the contemporary context of workshops, surgery, teaching or computers. The final result will be projected at night on a large structure, when 1999 changes into 2000 and the aim is to represent women from all over the world.

Cécile Proust and Jacques Hoepffner will stay 10 days in South Africa, mainly in Durban. The gestures they are interested in are either traditional (either in towns or in the country). They are searching for specific gestures which will show, through action, how a culture leads to a specific sense of touch and movement.

To share their space, they would like to meet women dancers, choreographers and artists to ask if they would be prepared to be filmed around the concept of "a gesture/message for the new century".

For details contact Jacques Hoepffner on e-mail: jacques.hoepffner@wanadoo.fr

Or write to 31, rue de la Réunion 75020 Paris France, Phone 33 (0)1 44 93 39 27 fax 33 (0)1 44 93 39 70 or visit the website http://perso.wanadoo.fr/aladin/