Phia Ménard

Phia Ménard is taking courses in juggling, contemporary dance, mime and acting.

She performed in several of Jérôme Thomas’s shows between 1994 and 2002. At the same time, she studied Hervé Diasnas’s approach to dance.

In 1998, she founded the Compagnie Non Nova, guided by the founding principle: ‘We do not invent anything; we simply see things differently’: Non nova, sed nove. She has been at the helm of the company alongside Claire Massonnet. Since then, her company has toured all over the world.

It was with the solo piece Ascenseur, a phantasmagoria designed to lift people and their burdens, in 2001, that she made her name as a creator. In November 2008, she created the performance L’après-midi d’un foehn Version 1, the first in the ‘Pièces du Vent’ series at the Natural History Museum in Nantes, for which she received the Edinburgh Fringe Physical Theatre Award in 2012.

In January 2014, she was appointed a Chevalier of the Order of Arts and Letters. Since then and to this day, she has notably served as an associate artist at various institutions in France and has directed operas.