Mathis Josselin

Mathis likes to devise protocols: tying his legs together to move forward, forbidding himself to use vowels when speaking, reading scientific texts he doesn’t understand at all with the self-assurance of a professional. A spectator in love, his soft heart makes him obsessive-compulsive both on-stage and off-stage. He once believed he had to be powerful, but has recently realised that his strength lay hidden in his foolishness. So he hunched his shoulders, became human again – TRAGIC FOOL & BRILLIANT FOOL – and no longer has stage fright. Ever since, he has been playing at life and sets about inventing a new grammar every time he steps onto the stage.

Mathis Josselin works in theatre. An actor and stage designer, he holds a Bachelor’s degree in Theatre from La Manufacture, having previously completed a double degree at the Sorbonne Nouvelle, where he studied the historical and theoretical dimensions of theatre and cinema. Today, he uses his body, his mind, his voice and texts to perform before an audience. He is interested in the very phenomenon of theatre, in the present moment he shares with the audience watching him. The word ‘acting’ is the word that makes him lose his mind the most; for him, it encompasses many things that unsettle him: truth, lies, vanity, power, failure – and, why not, poetry. His Bachelor’s project at La Manufacture, “La Peau Douce” (Soft Skin), created with his acting partner Gabrielle Pialoux, tells the story of two young queer people who question their relationship with sexuality and love by exposing their obsessions to the audience.