– performance and AR experience
We want to be trees. We want to serve as carriers of time.
We want to be mushrooms, fungus deeply rhizomised.
We are nature. Object of nature. We are the point where nature and technology meet. And – the sky is just there.
Nature Theatre of Oblivia works with the impressions, experiences and desires that nature offers us, as a concept and as a place to be, and something to become – like a forest in all its familiarity and uncanniness.
The project will be exploring our relation to nature in a technologically charged world. Nature Theatre of Oblivia will be using performance, and augmented realities – AR, Arilyn technology creating a two-fold experience where the live-performance is one part and the smart phone performance – Oblivia in the pocket using the Arilyn app – another.
Nature Theatre of Oblivia is a live performance and an augmented reality (AR) work, which is part of the and co-produced by the TECHNE project at Theater Rampe and Künstlerhaus Stuttgart in Germany.
In this performance Oblivia confronts theatrical techniques with those of nature. A forest occupies the Nature Theatre’s stage. A soft breeze catches in the trees: diffuse light flows over a widely ramified rootsystem. A rock lies motionless. A faint murmur fills the the tranquil scene. Then nothing. Suddenly, animals scamper past, stop listen intently, and vanish again. Or are they joggers? An owl’s call pierces the night.
The stage, throughout these scenes, stands empty: only the performers simulate the forest or are present as a forest. They immerse themselves in the specific laws. Its atmospheres between day and night, calm and storm, the slowness of trees and the agitation of fleeing animals inform the dramaturgy. Minimal gestures and movements, the sound of their voices and their bodies are the elements out of which the performers, in constant interaction, develop a richly rhythmical, nuanced, and often comedic tableau.
The Oblivia ensemble devised and honed the underlying technique, which they call ”Do what you saw” in a series of projects. It lets the performers create a fragile yet engrossing space of shared theatrical experience enveloping the audience.
Martina Grohmann, Intendantin of Theater Rampe, Stuttgart
CREDITS
Working Group
Devising: Working group
Performers: Mikko Bredenberg, Alice Ferl, Timo Fredriksson, Anna–Maija Terävä and Annika Tudeer.
Light: Meri Ekola
Sound: Alice Ferl
Costumes: Tua Helve
Augmented reality: Arilyn
Production: Marina Andersson-Rahikka, Jenny Nordlund
Coproducers
TECHNE project at Theater Rampe and Künstlerhaus Stuttgart in Germany;
Supporters
AVEK – The Promotion Centre for Audiovisual Culture & TINFO Theatre Info Finland
The premiere | 22nd of June 2017, Theater Rampe in Stuttgart.
