exhibition: I ONLY APPEAR TO BE DEAD at pq2019
hotel pro forma’s contribution to the ‘fragments’ exhibition
2019
Hotel Pro Forma has been invited to take part in the Prague Quadriennal of 2019.
Every four years the Prague Quadrennial showcases the best of Performance Design, Scenography and Theatre Architecture. Works by artists, professionals, and students from over 79 countries are presented through more than 600 live performances, talks, presentations, masterclasses, and workshops.
Our contribution to PQ 2019 is part of the Fragments exhibition, for which we have been selected to represent Danish performing arts:
“The exhibition Fragments recognizes and celebrates designs where the essence of the environment and the socio-political era is preserved, craft is perfected, and the artist becomes a beacon of the profession for their life achievements. Participating countries have selected only one item showing the most iconic or breakthrough set, costume, lighting, projection or sound design by one of their most celebrated “Living Legends” of performance design whose work keeps inspiring new generations of artists and audiences.”
– from the Fragments presentation at PQ.
The original performance I Only Appear to be Dead from 2005 focused on the darker side of Hans Christian Andersen’s journeys and fantasies. From the diaries concrete accounts and comments came to life as a number of scenic acts. Situations were acted out in several different versions. Hints of stories are shown in brief sequences, repeated to form long chains of events. A stream of images frozen by intersecting moments.
The title refers to the handwritten note Andersen would place on his bedside table at night, due to his fear of being buried alive. But the title can also refer to the enormous attention devoted to him and his literary and visual work in the present day.
A long and narrow stage (28 m x 4 m) followed the length of the room. Depth and distance between audience and performers were replaced by intimacy and a wide angle spatial experience. The stage was the path and the journey, where the events of life took place, subject to Andersen’s original optics.
