materials III

Performance Lab . Collaboration with Philine Herrlein/ Bettina Nampé/ Jari Ortwig . Kunstwerk . Cologne . 2018

Since 2015, “materials” is considered as a continuous research at the interface of dance and visual arts. This is reflected annually in a 50-hour performative laboratory, which is temporarily open to the public. From different perspectives the sculptural quality of body and movement is traced within a reflected exchange of the dancers Bettina Nampé and Philine Herrlein, the sculptor Linda Nadji and the curator Jari Ortwig – in theory and practice.

With “materials III”, questions that have been raised since 2015 on the basis of concrete materials such as plasterboard or damp clay within the labs, will be developed further: this year with the material “voice” and the “voice’s body”.

Under the guidance of vocalist Bettina Wenzel, the voice as medium, not only of emotion, rhythm and atmosphere, but also of form, spatiality and materiality is investigated. Thus, voice sounds can be full, round, rough, flat, linear, punctual.

How do these qualities relate to one another when viewed from a physical, aural, emotional and, ultimately, a sculptural perspective? How do vocal sounds change through movements and different postures? How does the use of the voice influence one’s own physicality? How do voices and bodies resonate in space? How does voice become visually tangible?

The voice defines a trace of the body in space, its presence is revealed in the physical as well as in the spatial. The voice forms a bridge from body to body, from body to space, can be shaped and modeled. It is event and materiality at the same time.

The 50-hour laboratory in the PIK Deutz / Atelierhaus KunstWerk e.V. in Cologne was open daily for spectators in a time window of 3 hours. The experimental and process-like format demanded some time from the visitor to engage in fine nuances and shifts in sound and image.