Skymningsfåglar (Dusk birds) - Katja Seitajoki & Arena Baubo
The jury’s motivation
Using darkness as a stage, this performance is full of sound, life and movement. It's a beautiful and carefully crafted spectacle that awakens the imagination and sharpens the senses. Mysterious night creatures come into view, creating evocative tableaux that remind us of the vastness and mystery of nature. There is a whole world that lives in the dark hours of the day and Arena Baubo's production brings it to life.
A reflection on the significance of darkness for the living.
Here you encounter the multitude of lively activity that occurs in nature while humans are usually asleep. An infinite darkness that we can neither explain nor understand, which is still a place with treetops looming in moonlight. Insects hard at work, bats hunting and glow worms playing hide and seek in the vegetation at night. An experience where we, just as during the hours of dusk, sense how light decreases and how the murky world of darkness takes over.
During the performance sound, movement, and light folds us into dark nature where eyes and ears, feelers and sensory bodies observe us in the night. The audience become part of the staging and in the darkness their outlines become vague, as the surroundings seep into them. Movement from bats, moisture, wind and glow worms shape the dancers’ bodies and leads the dance into the point of intersection between darkness and light. We speculate about how it is to be an animal, a plant or an insect with abilities especially adapted to the darkness.
In a time of round the clock consumption, light pollution and climate change we want to contemplate the darkness and ask ourselves what humans are in the opacity of nature. Through movement, text and sound beautiful and cruel scenes are created where we let the more-than-human lead us.
Credits:
Idea and choreography: Katja Seitajoki in collaboration with the dancers and Lisen Pousette
Dancers: Ellen Söderhult, Noah Hellwig and Lisen Ellard
Composer: Tomas Björkdal and Lena Swanberg
Text: Alexandra Loonin
Costume and scenography: Maline Casta
Light: Mira Svanberg
Photo: Jose Figueroa
Production: Arena Baubo
From 13 years
Time and place
Play time: 45 minutes