Relief

Live performance, film, 3D audio space, by Hotel Pro Forma, one of the most acclaimed performing arts companies in Europe today. The audience is equipped with headphones and taken on a journey through a multi-dimensional sound and image landscape of the Ukrainian city of Odessa – a virtual relief.

A performer, perhaps Vladimir Nabokov as a young man, is seen in real-time on the street outside the venue and relayed live onto the screen on stage. He has yet to decide on his life-path: will he become a scientist, a politician or a writer? Texts based on Nabokov’s writings are intertwined with the real-life stories of the people of Odessa.

Relief reflects on Ukraine from a European perspective using the work of Vladmir Nabokov, who had synaesthesia – a condition in which the person confuses sensory stimuli so that they “see sound” and “hear light”.

Concept: Ralf Richardt Strøbech, Kirsten Dehlholm
Special support: Danish Arts Council, Wilhelm Hansen Foundation
Duration: 72 minutes
Hotel Pro Forma web site

Developed in Odessa

Relief was developed during the SEAS research phase in 2007/2008 in Odessa Ukraine and in collaboration with UKR.tele.kom who organise music events, art happenings and underground cultural activities.

The concept of Relief

Hotel Pro Forma uses the conception of a ”relief” as a way to understand the world. Relief is the stage between image and space. The moment when the figure breaks free of the flat surface and gains its own independent life. When we decide who we want to be. When we discover that images become spaces that house a story.

The performance is a biopsy of the author Vladimir Nabokov at a time when he lived on the Crimean Peninsula (1916 to 1919). At this moment in his life he is dreaming of butterflies, not politics. Nabokov as an example of a man who is on the cusp of beginning his life. A man in relief.  It is also a performance about sensory perception –  the audience wears headphones so that voices, song, music and sounds are made present for each listener/onlooker.

Perception and geo-politics

How has the perception of the former Eastern-block countries changed from a 2-dimensional glance through the Iron Curtain to a broader, 3-dimensional understanding of the region as a part of a modern Europe? Through in-depth interviews with Ukrainians, adapted by the award-winning journalist Marie Tetzlaff, a fictive tale is created from the moments and stories which have affected this viewpoint.

Support: Danish Arts Council – Committee for the Performing Arts, Danish Arts Agency, Wilhelm Hansen Foundation, Danish Centre for Culture and Development, Consul Georg Jorck and Hustru Emma Jorcks Foundation, Toyota-Foundation and Autorkontoen.

Relief by Hotel Pro Forma