I’M HUMMING TO NUMB SOUNDS OF BURSTING

WHEN SOMETHING BREAKS, I SING.

How do we keep experiencing togetherness when everything falls apart? A choreographic research for a future among ruins. 

FDC's new production observes bodies and relationships at a moment of rising totalitarian forces. We experience how the cracks in and around us are widening. We rewind and fast-forward to understand: How long have the cracks been there? Do they reach so deep that they have already become a habitat in themselves? Has the house we live in perhaps been a ruin since it was built?

The dancers’ bodies oscillate between resiliance and collapse, longing for hope within discredited notions of cohesion. Do we retreat into the private sphere as society fractures, or do tender gestures give us the strength to hold and gather the shards?
We prepare for the loss of our present and pack time capsules for the future after the crash. What do we want to preserve? What do we have to let go of?

Two concepts have sparked this research: Kintsugi, the Japanese art of repairing porcelain that highlights its fractures, and Tikkun Olam – an ethical principle drawn from Jewish philosophy that calls to constantly repairing the world.

Under the choreographic direction of Elsa Artmann – a dancer of FORWARD DANCE COMPANY since 2021 – and in conceptual and dramaturgical collaboration with Dr. Gustavo Fijalkow, the company is working with language, sound, and movement to make its piece more accessible to blind and visually impaired audiences. It invites you to take part in an experiment: in addition to the visual elements, an independent auditory score is being created that can be experienced on its own.

In German and English.

In addition to the visual level, an independent auditory level emerges that can be perceived on its own.

Duration: approx. 60 minutes

Content and sensory notes:

• The play deals with crisis situations in a pictorial and poetic way
• People on stage use their voices at full volume, but do not shout
• Music, text, video, and movement often occur simultaneously
• The performers come close to the audience, always with prior announcement and without any obligation to participate
• There is an area in the audience where the performers sometimes whisper descriptions of the action