This artwork is a continuous commitment to performative manifestations on, with and about Liquids. A theatrical universe, a cosmology created through the use of thickened and coloured water, ropes, pumps, and soundscapes in constellation with gravity, various weather conditions, sunlight, snow, rain and sometimes people.UPG is an attempt to decentralise humans in performance. It is an ode and a reflection on the question of fluidity in the times of climate threats, juxtaposed with the universal desire for control over life.
With UPG, Ira Melkonyan is spending time with the metaphors of floods and natural disasters, drawing on a long tradition of repressing and taming the uncontrollable emanations of the body – its sounds, smells, and mucus – with a hysterical will to control and solidify borders. Objects, flows of air, gusts of wind coming through the open windows – they perform and they watch.
Genre: Performance Installation
Duration (40min) in the evening & Installation in the daylight (ongoing).
Winner of the ZKB Acknowledgement Prize 2019- Zürcher Theatrespektakel, Switzerland
“Ira Melkonyan & the rubberbodies collective show the effects of non-human behavior and question the assignment of authorship in the theater. This performative installation is an outstanding example of a political work of art. It does not “explain” nature, but invites us to follow the transformation of a leaky landscape and to experience it – with all its risks.” Here is the full Jury speech about the piece. “
Concept and creation: Ira Melkonyan
Co-creation, production design: Jimmy Grima @ TinyIslandStudio
Architectural development and design: Dominykas Savickas, Zsofie Paczolay
Dramaturgical advice: Maria Rößler
Supported by DAS Theatre, Amsterdam, the Netherlands; Production of the rubberbodies collective, Malta.
Video links
Please get in touch with Ira at ira@rubber-bodies.com for video materials.
