Conference

On the occasion of his entrance to the residence at Arsenal de Metz

Zad Moultaka goes in residence to the famous scene of the Arsenal of Metz for two years. The opportunity to take back several great pieces of his repertoire, to initiate ambitious projects, to experiment new forms with his ensemble Mezwej and to combine the tempos of the composer and the visual artist around the question of the sacred and of modernity haunts the Arab creator.

To put an end to Orientalism while finding a way towards a demanding contemporaneity that would not deny anything of the past and find a new spiritual impulse in resonance with very old energies. This research in the heart of Lorraine will stress the rich cultural and artistic fabric of the greater region.

The reception of artists in residence is at the heart of the project of Arsenal-Metz in Scenes. Forging links with composers living in and outside our region is a way to support creation, to question our relationship to art and to shake things up ahead of time.
The artist, the composer is part of a political, economic and social reality while being in an artistic and aesthetic research.
Fostering dialogue and exchange with the public is also one of our missions and the artists are there to animate them. Residences are also the moment when an artist, a composer, can give himself the time to experiment and look for new ways of advancing.

The reception of a composer is based on solid partnerships with the National Orchestra of Lorraine, Cefedem, the Regional Conservatory of Metz, Esal and a rich and active associative fabric. The residency allows the composer to present several works from his catalog, to create new ones and to share his research with students and amateur musicians.

Zad Moultaka is one of those singular composers who open up a different field in today’s music. All his work aims to seek a synthesis between the Arab musical tradition and modern Western writing. If he tends towards a certain abstraction, his language draws on poetry, sound research and emotion. He wonders what could be a contemporary Arab music. The relationship to music is complex in the Arab world and Zad Moultaka works to bring these two worlds into dialogue.
Artist, painter, composer and great lover of poetry, Zad Moultaka is a man of his time, marked by the years of violence in Lebanon and his exile in Paris. Faced with this fragmentation of time and space, he responds with music imbued with spirituality.

MICHÈLE PARADON,
Artistic delegate of Arsenal