Dear visitors to Gessnerallee, dear artists
With ‘Movements’, Monika Truong has created a performance about memory, resistance and collective hope. The piece combines personal biographies with collective experiences and focuses on people whose stories have made social change possible. Ahead of the premiere on 4 March, we asked the Zurich-based director three questions about the piece.
Gessnerallee: ‘Movements’ explores, celebrates and questions social change in all its complexity through the lives of three cultural pioneers and internationally renowned activists. What does it mean to work with real biographies?
Monika Truong: The performers are accomplices in the development of this work. We share personal experiences and gain collective ones. In line with the guiding principle of the equality movement, ‘The personal is political,’ we were able to uncover asymmetrical power relations in conversations and rehearsals that arise from personal situations and are reflected in personal experiences.
Inequality is to be condemned as a result of social power structures. In everyday life, however, it is often very personal. The real biographies therefore play a kind of dual role in ‘Movements’: Zainab J Lascandri, Salma Said and Steven Schoch bring their realities into the development of the layers and moments of tension in the play and bring them to the stage with radical honesty.
In the end, change often fails because of small, personal hurdles. When we talk about a crisis of democracy alongside many other crises today, this debate becomes central. How do we find our way as free, self-determined individuals in fragmented societies? And how do we get involved in movements as courageous, responsible people?
Which encounters or stories particularly touched you while working on ‘Movements’?
We repeatedly experienced ‘Movements’ as a kind of ritual performance that uses ‘shout-outs’ to address those who have had a decisive influence on our worlds. Voices that often go unheard in our society are given space. Marginalised stories are honoured and brought into relation with the collective discourse. The most moving part was the reappraisal of the stories of the three performers' families and friends. Personal accounts and biographies illustrate how friends were imprisoned, families torn apart and people forced to flee. The interaction between these two spheres became the determined focus of our work. Remembering, recounting and honouring together becomes a political act.
Together with the audience, you want to acknowledge the often overlooked yet so important work of family, friends, neighbours or casual acquaintances. The practice of ‘shout-outs’ mentioned above originated during the Great Migration movement in the USA and has its roots in African-American churches. What should the audience take home with them after the evening?
Migration transcends geographical and cultural boundaries and gives rise to new forms of expression. The passing on of personal songs with lyrics about slavery, which originated in African-American churches, has had a lasting impact on the music landscape. It has created a sense of belonging and identity for entire communities.
With our ‘shout-outs,’ we want to return to the origins, where it becomes clear that collective experiences and shared stories become the fuel for social change.
Rights and achievements that many today take for granted were fought for by a few. Looking back is not about nostalgia, but about finding motivation for the movements that are yet to come – that must come. Together with the audience, we experience ‘hope as practice’. Hope is not passive waiting, but an active commitment to keep going.
Secure your tickets now for the performances of ‘Movements’ on 4, 5, 6 and 7 March.
Now for an overview of the programme, newspaper articles, news and everything else we want to share with you:
Programme
27 and 28 February, 2 and 3 March
‘Collapse in 5 Acts: There Is Porn of It’ by Simone Aughterlony
Amidst swathes of fog, fallen pipes and broken monuments, enigmatic figures meet: a king, a narrator, a radical fairy, tourists, wounded people, a horse, an architect. Aughterlony's new work explores the aesthetics of collapse and asks how new perspectives can emerge from the ruins. Secure your tickets now for the premiere on Friday, 27 February. More information
