Three mongols playing Mongols. Dschingis Khan, the opening performance of Something Raw, is provocative and consistent. With this performance by the German theatre collective Monstertruck, or the also Berlin-based Man Power Mix of Sheena Mcgrandles and Zinzi Buchanan, does the festival Something Raw lives up to its name.
Something Raw is a festival in which Amsterdam theatres Frascati, De Brakke Grond and Veem collaborate. It has long shown emerging experimental performance artists and theatre makers from the international field. The central question this year is again what theatre and performance can mean in a time marked by encroaching technology and cultural clashes. The posthumanist theme does not seem to apply to all representations, but it is a useful starting point.
Dschingis Khan is poignant and problematic. Three actors with Down syndrome are portrayed as ethnic Mongolians, their so-called traditions summed up in resounding clichés, which of course make no sense at all. The tourist industry that has turned every corner of the world into a consumer good, with all its consequences, is just a side street in this ultimately very vulnerable performance.
Dschingis Khan cunningly employs the method of stage upon stage. The regime enforced on the spot by direction and technique, mirrors the dominance of Western thinking and acting, which pretends to be further along and know better, diligently projecting its own incompetence and impotence onto non-Western 'others'.
Otherwise, the three actors won't care. They play with pleasure when given the space to do so. Food, drink, sex and sweet attention then play a big part. Unencumbered, they make fun of each other as monkeys. And that is the masterstroke in Dschingis Khan, that the unlimited projection of impotence and incomprehension, disguised as norms and values that everyone should believe in, is replaced by the reality, sincere commitment and gentle gestures of three how-ever less able-bodied people. The difference in EQ is not glossed over, the actors doing their own show, airing their own values, sharing that with the audience. No re-education here in the name of civilisation, no patronising either, but real attention and a critical look at what is normally understood by civilisation.
Another trend is a remarkable penchant for modernism, clear contrasts, plain symbolism. Representations such as Antithesis, the future of the image by Belgian Michiel Vandevelde and Kat Válastur's Ah Oh! A contemporary ritual present the world in an overly well-ordered way, making it appear somewhat frenetic, almost conventional.
Válastur's contemporary ritual, for example, harks back in many ways to the modern dance of the last century. The movement is in the service of an idea, instrumentalised as it were. The idea, a doomsday scenario based on the opposition between individual and group, is confirmed in every detail of the performance. Nowhere is a stitch loose, never is there a dead end. Although the coupling of held breath and bulging cheeks with action is an intriguing premise, the mechanism works mainly as an illustration of the idea rather than an engine of mutation and transformation. The control is exquisite and with it the performance is also terribly predictable. The dancers work up a sweat, cool jackets and ditto surround sound create a hip vibe, but that one post-industrial, post-apocalyptic image is really too familiar to me. No questions are asked, no relativity developed, the choreographer leaves an egg, and the dancers do their best to live up to this notion of humanity. The performance could premiere at a modern dance company in no time.
There is also 'not quite finished' work on show during Something Raw. Casca's D'Ovo by Lisbon-based Lander Patrick & Jonas Lopes impresses with the care with which corporeal feeling and formal composition are playfully combined. Blindfolded, the two men perform a virtuoso pas-de-deux, in which raunchy blows are struck. Unfortunately, the rock-solid and minimalist premise is not carried through to the end. The end of the performance is a tableau vivant that places a naked gay couple in embrace among other 'very ordinary' people, extras who vacuum, walk in with an AH bag or do gymnastic exercises. It is a statement with nothing wrong with it, but as a scene, the tableau seems to belong in another play.
And that's the good thing about this Something Raw: it shows not only rough, but also fairly young work. The festival thus involves spectators in current questions and proposals from different places in Europe, and ensures that international talent comes to Amsterdam. And that is much needed, because the international experimental theatre offer has become meagre in the capital. This is not only about finance, but also about attention, taking time, carefully entering into international alliances and developing vision, daring to stick their heads out, giving artists space before they are seasoned creators - and that is lacking in many places in the Netherlands, not only in Amsterdam.
Friday 12 and Saturday 13 February there are still plenty of performances at Frascati and Brakke Grond, for programme see the website of Theatre Frascati.
Click through to Vimeo for a nice interview with Manuel Gerst und Sahar Rahimi of Monster Truck.
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