Performances / Installations
A human being is motionless in a window gallery flooded by water. The sensory changes brought about by the changing environment trigger a trance state. Microphones amplify the sounds of his breathing and movements. IN is a nerve-wracking representation of the experience of confinement.
MASS presents an otherworldly poetic landscape, a dance of thick clouds which capture and hold the light. This cloud matter moves independently, generating its own energy. We witness a series of chemical and physical processes of organic evolution; left to their own devices, they carry on endlessly.
PRESYNCOPE, a video installation, consists of a long pan with a camera slowly traveling down the façade of a very tall building. The ground gradually gets closer while a deadpan voice lists off the ideas and impressions of a falling person.
All built around issues of movement, voice, and the absence/presence of the human body, this trio of installations by Belgian artist Kris Verdonck offers a fascinating prism through which to glimpse human experience, including its darker corners. Straddling the line between visual art and theater, installation and performance, Verdonck’s work brings unmoving people together with objects in motion, exploring the multiple permutations of meaning in surprising settings.
Concept and direction: Kris Verdonck
Dramaturgy: Marianne Van Kerkhoven (Kaaitheater)
With: Eveline van Bauwel
Voice: Jean Ugeux
Filming and editing: Vincent Pinckaers
Sound design: Thomas Turine
Technical coordination: Colin Legras / Luc Schaltin (Kaaitheater), Sylvain Spinoit
Construction: Sylvain Spinoit
Video editing: Massimiliano Simbula
Software and Electronics: Felix Luque
Production: Margarita Production pour stilllab vzw, A Two Dogs Company vzw
Production manager: Hendrik De Smedt
Scientific research: Jean-Jacques Cassiman, Dirk De Ridder, Philippe Fraisse, Jean Paul Van Bendegem, Dirk Van Hulle
Coproduced by Theater der Welt 2010 (Germany), Transdigital (Interreg), Centre d’Arts Vooruit (Belgium), Productiehuis Rotterdam/Rotterdamse Schouwburg (Netherlands), Kaaitheater (Belgium), Kunstencentrum BUDA, festival VIA (Manège.Mons, Belgium & Manège.Maubeugem, France), LIRMM (France), Kunstenfestivaldesarts (Belgium), Beursschouwburg (Belgium), Kunstencentrum België, in collaboration with Schauspiel Essen (Germany), Le manège.mons (Belgium) and Technocité (Belgium) as part of Transdigital, with funding from Autorités flamandes, Commission communautaire flamande (VGC) and Région de Bruxelles-Capitale.
Photo: A Two Dogs Company