The Moon

M AISON D AHL B ONNEMA

The Moon

by

MaisonDahlBonnema (NL/NO/FR/USA/FI/BE)


The Moon is a song-situation for 4 singers conceived as One-Big-Song shared and sung together. It is set in a possible now, where solitude, loneliness and the impossibility to communicate, are sublimated and replaced by an eternal adolescence full of togetherness: a life in the middle of countless possibilities. Fluid identities in a state of refusal for the impossible choices between the various disguises of contemporary


nothingness


The Moon can live as an early magic formula: a perforated art-synthesis shaped in a ritual. It is inspired by nothingness and sameness. Neither fiction nor reality but an artificiality: A reflection of a highly weird thus normal virtuality. The Moon invites the audience on a trip : a celebration of the subnormal.

In a concentrated atmosphere we are stretching our brains in this moony constellation together with the audience.

So, let’s dig that hole! And make it deep! Or as they say in Emmental: the holes are also cheese.

Eat, taste, smell, look, listen.

19 Songs.


Enjoy The Moon.




per-/platformers

Bonnema, Anna Sophia

Dahl, Hans Petter Melø

Freeman, Davis

Preiss, Joana


concept/idea

Bonnema, Anna Sophia

Dahl, Hans Petter Melø


text

Bonnema, Anna Sophia


music

Dahl, Hans Petter Melø


moonlight by

Tiikkainen, Minna


dramaturgy by

Steijn, Robert


moonwear by

Meeussen, Lieve

MaisonDahlBonnema


production by

Sekse, Gulli

MaisonDahlBonnema


productional assistance

Blaute, Eva


co-produced by

Needcompany(BE), De School van Gaasbeek(BE), BIT Teatergarasjen(NO) , Dansefestival Barents(NO), Avantgarden(NO), Veem House for Performance(NL).


with support from

Norsk Kulturråd & The Flemish Authorities


special thanx

De Brakke Grond

Rankka,Yrjänä




Shinelist

Earth-dramaturgy: Between the 22nd of November and the 20th of January each year, a period of winter darkness sets in in Hammerfest. So just before the sun disappears for 2 months, The Moon will have its earth-premiere.


12/11/2016 First Earth-Shining of The Moon, DanseFestival Barents, Hammerfest (NO)

15/11 - 16/11/2016 The Moon, Avantgarden Trondhjem (NO)

18/11 - 19/11/2016            The Moon, BIT Bergen(NO)

30/11 - 03/12 /2016 The Moon, De Brakke Grond, Amsterdam (NL)

14/3/2017 The Moon, Ainsi/Theater aan het Vrijthof, Maastricht(NL)

15/9/2017 The Moon, Fjalerfestivalen, Dale i Sunnfjord (NO)

20/6/2018 The Moon, Malta Festival, Poznan (PL)



intended further shinings in Norway and abroad in 2018 and 2019.



We live in a fragmented world with a lot of different opinions running around us. We know that every opinion fits only within a certain context. Nothing is generally accepted anymore. Clashes of strong opinions cause polarization. Even when we have strong opinions, we don't know how to live them. Opinions stay mostly virtual, a method to position ourselves towards others. A ritual can give us a glimpse of a more embracing reality beyond the clash of opinions. It gives us the opportunity to behave in a way that feeds our belief in still unknown possible worlds. Such rituals can develop sensitivities in body and mind, which we usually cannot experience in another way. We need the isolated time period of a ritual to let ourselves become different. Rituals are highly artificial. They put themselves out of the rush of daily life and guide us to do certain tasks we never would do voluntarily. We practice a way of being, which we still can't live in our daily connections. By repeating these rituals we start to master a different perspective on ourselves and on our position in the world. Or at least bring us some of its energy in the complicated world we live in.

Sometimes a theatre performance functions as such kind of ritual; it practices visionary perspectives on life by dictating and exploring different aesthetics and ways of being. Opera as a ritual practices the most artificial universe that we can imagine. It gives the voice all the space to transcend the tragedy of human life, or the political or spiritual dimensions of a human ideology. The body itself disappears in this ritual; it becomes heavy, almost not moving in space. Its presence has lost its energetic radiance; the body is only there to support the existence of the voice. In “The Moon”, which is more a one-big-song-performance than an opera in the traditional sense, the body regains its immanent vitality. It becomes the centre point of a ritualized universe. While singing an ocean of reflections and thoughts, the bodies create naive patterns in time and space that could alternately refer to minimal art principles of the sixties or the basic dances of utopian communities at the beginning of the twentieth century. The performance “The Moon” practices a physical belief in abstraction, beyond the behavioral laws of social contact. It gives a glimpse of a universe, where everything becomes one because of a shared interest in the naivety of form and devotion in execution.

What happens when we stop thinking in multilayered fragmentation? Can we build a transparent universe by living the most basic forms of movements, steps and gestures in this ritual? At the same time the ritual can become a platform that harvests the fruits of our inner reflections, stimulated by the light of the moon. The singing ritual shows what could happen when organic life on earth doesn't grow anymore with the support of the sun; its development is dependent on the reflected light of the moon only. What will happen when we don’t manifest ourselves any longer under the heat of the sun, but only in a light that has no temperature at all? In a metaphoric way, what happens when we live outside the heat of the moment? When we are not longer condemned to meet each other and ourselves in a confrontation of burning desires and burning conflicts? What happens when we breathe, think and dream within an objective light that illuminates us by cooling us down? A light that does not provoke, upset or disturb us to take immediate action. Any human drama is far away. We float in periods of nothingness; we mirror ourselves with some holes in our existence. Confronted with this void we have the choice to get crazy with each other, or remain silent. There is no logic or reason behind what we can do, only a belief in the pleasure of execution.

Let us practice to become moon-sick in this way, to become an outsider from the inside.

Robert Steijn

here under: B&W-live-action-photos by Lambert de Jong

other photos MDB/HPMD

For information or a photo: please take contact.