Silent Trio, Epilogue

Performance im November 2021, Tanzfabrik Berlin

Memories and Reflections

Veröffentlicht im Herbst 2021, Spielzeit Publikation Tanzfabrik Berlin: «to be real, an object» von SUSANNA YLIKOSKI

"Silent Trio, Epilogue is the final work in a series, in which artists Christina Ciupke and Darko Dragičević engaged with the heritage of Spomenik monuments spread across the former Yugoslavia and explored the urban, once politically charged ruins of Berlin while participating in the life cycle of trees. I witnessed the work on the 3rd of November when it premiered at Tanzfabrik’s Berlin autumn program. My experience of the work is that of tension, balance, the effect of time on the phenomena of how meaning takes form, and a deep sense of coherence. Now, upon starting to write, I am immediately confronted with the incoherent nature of thought. Despite this, I hope that my utterances will transmit the richness of the work. For this reason, I have deliberately left the description of the performance in the dark and utilized a play on the present and past tense. Before entering the performance space, each member of the audience receives a cup of warm juice, courtesy of a new café opening, and a headset: How does meaning take form? The performance of Christina Ciupke and Darko Dragičević invites my attention to fall onto the experience of time; the time needed to allow something to come into existence. The simplicity and repetitiveness of the actions performed on the vast stage, with each image concretely existing for an extended period, allows me to enter a process in which meaning gradually takes form and transforms over time. Curiously, the headset highlights this overbearing sense of transitivity; the fluid nature of who we are at each moment. More curiously, I feel no isolation. Instead, I feel invited to become conscious of my own perception of sound, a deeply private process. An act of connecting to my own sensorial body bridges a tacit connection between me and the performance, bringing my attention on how experience forms, through memories, my self-identity. My body and the memorial monument become alike. A Spomenik monument is projected. I see a seemingly huge and dark stone. The shape reminds me of a wide bowl or a strange antenna, as if it was either holding the sky or transmitting information between the sky and the earth."

"On stage, the two bodies appear to be inseparable both from each other and from their shared environment. I experience the rootedness of the monument, and that of the performance. I am brought forth the quality of things, of mattering. I find myself connecting to something that is tacitly subdued, perhaps arising from the abstract nature of the performance and of monuments wherever."

"The nature of monuments is to be in a constant tension between motion (erosion) and the in-ability to move (to shift in location). This brings forth the erosion of thought: not only are our bodies affected by the lived environment - so are our minds. This immense impermanence and logic are made tangible in the performance. By its simple beauty: how attentive the two performers are in their acts and being, and the allowed space and time in every moment, confronts me with a sudden fear of forgetting. Despite there being no physical touch in the performance, I feel profoundly touched. The concreteness of the two performative bodies reminds me of something I wrote in my diary in the summer 2020: «be real. be an object.»"

ganzer Text: https://tanzfabrik-relaunch2020.s3.amazonaws.com/downloads/363/11_Tanzfabrik_Spielzeitpublikation_to-be-real.pdf?1671098792


 

Silent Trio. Chapter#5: Digital Postcards

Video- und Sprachchoreografien bei MontagModus im November 2020

Aufmerken, bemerken - von Jette Büchsenschütz

Veröffentlicht am 25.11.2020 auf tanzschreiber.de

„In fünf performativen „Postkarten“ werden wir – eine begrenzte Gruppe von 15 Teilnehmen¬den – physisch mit dem Recherchematerial vertraut gemacht. Ein Vimeo-Link führt zur ersten Postkarte: wir blicken auf das Podgarić-Denkmal, das im kroatischen Berek steht. Wind dröhnt in meinen Ohren, Vögel zwitschern, Bienen sausen an mir vorbei, ein Hahn kräht. Die dramatische Architektur, ein brutalistisches Raumschiff, gestrandet im Nirgendwo, setzt den visuellen Kontrapunkt zu den akustischen Eindrücken der umgebenden Natur. […]

Züge rauschen vorbei und in meinem Kopf entsteht das Zusammenspiel, ein Duett, das ich im Oktober leider verpasst habe mir anzuschauen. Aber die Trauer über Versäumtes wird kompensiert von der Faszination, die „Silent Trio Chapter#5: Digital Postcards“ in mir auslöst. Postkarte für Postkarte, Schicht für Schicht entsteht vor unseren Augen und in unseren Körpern eine Choreografie des gemeinsamen „Eingedenkens“, der allmählichen Herstellung einer Erfahrung, dass unsere alternden Körper Denkmäler sind – voller Erinnerungen: Solche, die wir wahrhaben wollen und pflegen und solche, die wir lieber verdrängen und verrotten lassen.“


Silent Trio. Chapter#4: Unfinished Archives

Performance im Oktober 2020, Tanzfabrik Berlin, Open Spaces - How to get in touch with...

Monday Movie Talk von Bettina Hirsch im Interview mit Felicitas Zeeden

Veröffentlicht am 09.11.2020 bei Radio Alex Berlin

„Ich finde sie ist einfach eine grandiose Tänzerin mit einer ganz ausgefeilten Technik, mit ganz präzisen Bewegungen, mit einer exakten Bewegungssprache und immer einer ganz klugen Dramaturgie dahinter. Und genau diese Mischung machen ihre Stücke immer zu einem Highlight für mich. Und die Stücke finden oft statt in Kooperation mit anderen Künstlern, in dem Fall mit Darko Dragičević, der dazu auch einen ganz interessanten Gegenpart darstellt. […] Bei Christina Ciupke merkt man, die ist die Grand Dame und die weiß ganz genau was sie da tut, […] das ist eine sehr erfahrene Tänzerin, die ein ganz großes Repertoire hat, sowohl an Bewegungen als auch an choreografischen Ideen. […] Also schon allein wegen Christina muss man schon mal wieder zu Open Spaces […]

Hier wird man reingezogen und dann kann man sich entwickeln. Man kann sich das angucken, das sehen, was man selbst sehen will und geht so ein bisschen als anderer Mensch raus, wenn man das gesehen hat. […] Diese Nähe zu den Künstler:innen, die man selber hat, wenn man so nah dran ist, die schafft ja das wirkliche Erlebnis mittendrin zu sein und auch ganz leise Geräusche - so wie bei Christina und Darko - so wie Fußklappern, atmen und das Rascheln von Kleidung, die werden Teil der Performance. […] Also es ist eigentlich eine fantastische Zuschauer:innen Situation.“


 

Silent Trio, Chapter#3: Spomenik

Audiowalk

52°55’N, 13°37’E TO 43°55’N, 20°30’E - von So Young H.Kim

Veröffentlicht im Herbst 2021 in Tanzfabrik Berlin, Spielzeit Publikation, Fall 2021

„ Starting Port: Uferstudios (52° 55’ N, 13° 37’ E), the familiar spot for the majority of the group. Thirteen bodies mostly stranger to each other but destined to share two hours of their lives. The headset, connected to GPS, was placed tight on my ears and soon poured unfamiliar machinery sounds along with a description of Spomenik, a man-made object commemorating the resistance against fascism in the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, and the brutality and struggles during the People’s Liberation War. As we strolled down a path (...) I couldn’t help but wonder if the sounds that were landing on my ears came from the headset or from the actual surroundings. Is the sound coming from a space that holds Spomenik since 1960–80, or from the space across which my body is currently moving? That was how Christina Ciupke and Darko Dragičević’s choreography of moving space hooked onto me. (...) The scenery was made of two distinct layers: a tangible place in which my body was moving, and an auditory landscape, which has been traversed by the artists themselves. The two landscapes formed an elastic distance that shifts constantly during the performance.

The audio files of the first two Spomenik sites focused mainly on exterior descriptions of the monuments, their historical value, and their surroundings. (...) the group had reached a basketball court,(...) There, a few teenagers were bouncing the ball in radiant sunlight. Their sweaty voices merged in the background of Christina’s voice which dominated my senses, explaining the history of the concentration camp around the monuments. As my brain organically illustrated the ruins from the camp site from audio files, my eyes were witnessing the kids with basketballs chasing one another. This ironical superimposition eliminated the thin line between the spaces. (...)

(...)The piece was designed to allow two different spaces to co-exist in time through the synesthesia. The auditory experience created a space for the imagination to enhance and recharge the available sensorial elements. For our bodies are wired to imagine the unknown. For our bodies are designed to empathize. Two weeks after the Audio Walk, I could barely remember the people’s faces who walked along side of me during these two hours. How- ever, when I cross a random street corner in Berlin, sceneries from former Yugoslavia, where I have never visited, and the walking rhythm of that day, reappear as if out of the blue. (...).“

ganzer Text: https://tanzfabrik-relaunch2020.s3.amazonaws.com/downloads/314/6_Tanzfabrik_Spielzeitpublikation_52-55N_13-37E.pdf?1659711067