The Artificial Nature Project

In The Artificial Nature Project a new encounter between human and non- human performers emerges from the following questions:

What does it mean to make a choreography for materials where human movement is no longer in the center of attention?

How can one address the force of things, materials, objects and matters as something that acts upon humans?

What is the relationship between the animate and the inanimate world?

The outcome is a performance that literally throws things around. Materials fly through the air giving rise to a landscape that constantly transforms itself. Throughout the performance the view is persistently changing: a calm contemplative site may turn into an energetic chaos of stuff being projected into space. Or, a flood wave becomes a storm of confetti whirling through the air, rushing over the stage. The theater stage gets covered with and traversed by various objects and raw materials, creating a disastrous mess of small, thick, light, big, heavy, thin, breakable and resistant things. The materials are set into motion by dancers, composing a body that is no longer made of human flesh but rather of a floating, flying mass. The emerging choreography is partly performed by human, partly by non-human performers set in motion. The movement mutates the appearance and perception of these materials in many forms: from an abstract sculpture, a swarm of animals, to a sandstorm overwhelming the humans who get stuck inside it. One image is replaced by another, rapidly altering our perception of a glittering landscape.

Premiered in 2012 at PACT Zollverein, Essen

Texts & interviews

The Artificial Nature Project – Interview with Mette Ingvartsen
The Artificial Nature Project – Or how to make choreography for nonhuman performers