empty stage.
a dog being very still.
waiting.
the gap between a dog and their human
the gap between a child and their mother
the gap between an artist and the theatre
notes for
a performance
the Philosopher tells us that when a dog's master dies, the dog will wait for the master to come back, even if they never do.
the Mother wearing angel wings climbs up the upstage wall with the intention of jumping. she is shoeless. once at the top, a group of firefighters enter and prepare a trampoline.
an inclined stage, around 75°.
at the top, a neon sign that says:
“THE RETURN”
100 dogs rush onstage, barking and competing with one another to run/crawl up the stage. this takes a while.
as each dog reaches the top they jump off.
a strobe light, speeding up and slowing down, dying.
the Young Daughter sucks and inhales a helium balloon. monologue is said with helium voice.
the Young Daughter bangs a drum and is shushed by others offstage. she beats it again, and is shushed. she beats it and starts to sing, but is shushed. this goes on until she concedes and claps her hands silently, mouthing the words to her song.
a large mound of earth.
the Young Daughter in funeral attire, shovelling, shovelling, shovelling.
the Mother and the Young Daughter stand across from each other. each one has a bucket of rocks in one hand and a cup in the other. they take turns filling the cup with rocks and throwing them at one another.
kneeling, arms spread open,
looking up, crying?
...
PB: Let's talk about some of these images. Who is the Mother?
MVS: Oof. Mary? My mom? Her mom? Maybe my future self? Maybe the child’s idealization of a mother?
PB: Should we unpack that more?
MVS: Maybe later.
PB: Next question. Why do we want to see dogs on stage?
MVS: What's your answer?
PB: I think it’s because they add a certain kind of unplanability—
MVS: Is that a word?
PB: Something that can’t be totally incorporated into the theatre machine.
MVS: But it is incorporated. The dog is on stage.
PB: I mean I think a dog—or dogs—adds something chaotic. An unpredictability that threatens the well-rehearsed performance. Animals threaten theatre’s… What would you say?
MVS: I would say animals draw attention in the theatre when on stage. Although the nature of them is more unpredictable than a seasoned performer, I think they actually just change how we’re… When we’re looking through theatre—and you put an animal (or fire or a baby) on stage—you see that the representation fails. The representation of the dog is broken, because the dog isn’t pretending to be something other than what it is. But I think so much of our theatre is trying to be in that flux of representation.
PB: You mean that space where representation has failed? The dog destabilizes representation-
MVS: The dog, the fire, the baby, they all are what they are on stage.
PB: So they have something uncontrollable about them. Or rather, they do what they do. It’s not a compulsion, but they don’t have a way of stopping what they are doing… I’m just trying to bring this back to the question eventually of the title of this piece. But go on.
MVS: I think it’s less about their unpredictability and more about their lack of pretending. Because we could get a highly trained dog on stage, and with its trainer on hand, we’ll get the same results 9.8 times. Or the image of, for example, a baby. We know that the baby doesn’t know it is symbolizing something else. So we can still see it as a representation, but there’s something about knowing as spectators that these kinds of elements aren’t committed to the theatre’s world in the same way as actors.
PB: Is this lack of commitment to the world of representation in theatre what we might call a gap? Is it the gap that we’re also referring to at the beginning of these notes?
MVS: No, I think the gap we’re talking about at the beginning of the notes is outside the theatre, for the first two.
PB: Right. We’re also talking about mothers, as well as theatre as an art form. Maybe let’s say that the gap, or the distance between the dog actor and the human actor, is actually tied up in all these thoughts as well. What I’m thinking about is the idea that someone like Derrida writes about in his essay on Artaud. He says something like Artaud was trying to close the gap of representation. And for Derrida, that’s impossible. Representation always is predicated upon a kind of gap. Maybe what we’ve stumbled upon here is a kind of invitation to think about these other relationships that we desire to be closed but can never be closed. The dog and the human. The mother and the child. The artist and the theatre.
MVS: What do you mean by closed?
PB: No gap. A oneness. Or a unity. I think for Artaud it’s something about a fullness as well—It’s a good essay. I remember when I read it in undergrad it was like my worlds, theatre and philosophy, collided.—Anyways.
MVS: Ah yes fullness. Are you hungry?
PB: Yes.
MVS: Let’s come back to this…
posters as performance
wie ein Hund, der zu seinem Erbrochenen zurückkehrt
como perro que vuelve a su vómito
like a dog who goes back to its vomit
interview
On posters as performance // essay