Commissioned by FuturePerfect and The New York Public Library
Shuffle, the new performance installation by Elevator Repair Service, Mark Hansen and Ben Rubin, is now part of the Intersection: Intimacy and Spectacle project of the Prague Quadrennial. The project’s aim is to explore contemporary forms of scenography by looking at scenography as a discipline between theatre and visual arts and by exploring scenography through performative spaces and environments. In contemporary art, which takes the relationship between the spectator and art piece as one of the main issues, these performative environments are crucial.
Shuffle is an entirely new kind of ERS performance, one with constantly re-generated text and a dream-like logic. In this work the company looks back on its last three pieces, informed by current research in database aesthetics—the role of data in creating new ways of experiencing and making art. The result is a site-specific (fever dream) where the company attempts to read “The Great Gatsby,” “The Sound and the Fury” and “The Sun Also Rises” simultaneously. The rearranged and overlapping texts produce compelling visual displays designed by Rubin and surprising, often absurd, micro-theater featuring many veteran ERS performers. Audience is encouraged to wander among the performers as they improvise . With scripts generated in real time by digital algorithms, phrases from the iconic novels of F. Scott Fitzgerald, William Faulkner and Ernest Hemingway merge to create a look back at some of America’s favorite texts that are at once disorienting and enlightening.
June 16 - 26, 2011
National Theatre of Prague
The Piazzetta
Ostrovní 225/1
11000 Praha 1-Nové Město, Česká republika
Map