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Metamorphoses

Manuela Infante, Michael De Cock & Diego Noguera / KVS
Sat 17.07.2021 - Sun 14.05.2023
17.07.2021
-
14.05.2023

Two thousand years ago, the Roman poet Ovid wrote his masterpiece Metamorphoses. It’s a wonderful book full of mystery but at the same time also a book in which women and nymphs are chased by men, lose their voices and are transformed into stones, water, animals…

The starting point for Manuela Infante’s piece is a question: how is the concept of “human” being produced in these stories? Why is nature a separate territory, and why are  women so easily expulsed into that fabricated otherness or wilderness? By inventing an Otherness and attaching women to it, ‘human’ is being delimited as a privileged place for men. No wonder then that alt-right groups today venerate these classics as models of behaviour for twenty-first century modern man …

Still, working with these texts is important for Infante: “We need to deconstruct the canon from within. These kinds of pieces aren’t only about damaging dogmas – the beauty of it is that all the ingredients we need to approach the world in a completely different way are contained within them too. It’s why it’s so rich and useful to work with a writer like Ovid.”

Infante seeks out how the border dividing human from non-human is fabricated in the text, and then infringes it. For don’t those same distinctions form the basis of people’s – white men’s – arguments to allow for categorising and thus colonising to exploit or appropriate? What difference whether it’s about colonizing women or people of colour, animals or nature? By vampirizing, sucking out the blood, of these outdated fabricated categories, Infante opens nowadays ways to deal with ancient literature. 

The new piece could be best described as a ‘noise play’ in which all voices are processed live. In the enchanted soundscape thus created, voice is not an expression of human agency but rather a more-than-human thing. A voice is a thing borrowed from the wind, that entangles humans and non-humans in endless ventriloquisms, refrains and echoes, without ever belonging to either.


19:30 INTRODUCTION by Gladys Vercammen-Grandjean

Is part of the selection:

Manuela Infante is a world-renowned Chilean theatre creator, known to the KVS public from her previous creations Estado Vegetal and Metamorphoses. For many years she has been investigating how the boundaries between the human and non-human are fabricated, in order to subsequently tear them down. In Estado Vegetal she plays with intelligence and communication within the plant world, in Realismo she rattles our ingrained ideas about objects and in Metamorphoses she questions whether a voice is an exclusively human prerogative. With How to Turn to Stone she continues down this path and immerses herself in mineral matters. 

Podcast KVS en route: Metamorphoses

Let us introduce Metamorphoses to you: a noise play based on Ovid's masterpiece. Director Manuela Infante, sound designer Diego Noguera and actors Luna Deboos and Jurgen Delnaet will guide you through…
Podcast

Próximamente 2021

Latin America presents a powerful,  surprising selection of performances in Brussels. 22.11.2021 > 28.11.2021

Manuela Infante on Metamorphoses

Manuela Infante lights a fire under western ideology, using Ovid’s Metamorphoses as basis.
Interview

From book to play

A copy of Ovid’s Metamorphoses in a Brussels book shop became the starting point for an artistic collaboration between theatre creator Manuela Infante and artistic director of KVS Michael De Cock. Cit…
Interview
'The "Metamorphoses" are updated with an unusual interpretation that highlights the violent and authoritarian aspects of classical Roman civilization. By focusing on the sources of the relations between the human and the non-human, the masculinist character that is at the roots of the birth of Western culture emerges.'
Gli Stati Generali
'Once again, the Chilean director got it right, offering a lucid introspection into the history of Western culture: an illuminating vision with a strong contemporary slant.'
Gli Stati Generali
"Problematische films of teksten moeten we niet afwijzen, maar zien als tools om iets nieuws mee te doen."
De Standaard
'Rarely do you come across a Beckett. So, when we do encounter one, we are delighted to tell you about it. After her excellent Estado Vegetal, Manuela Infante is confirming her status as an exceptional playwright. '
Le Soir

Credits

Hannah Berrada

Luna De Boos

Jurgen Delnaet

Credits

REGIE / MISE EN SCÈNE / DIRECTION Manuela Infante ORIGINELE TEKST / TEXTE ORIGINAL / ORIGINAL TEXT Ovidius CONCEPT & DRAMATURGIE Manuela Infante TEKST ADAPTATIE / TEXTE ADAPTÉ / TEXT ADAPTED BY Michael De Cock & Manuela Infante MUZIEK & GELUIDSONTWERP / MUSIQUE & CONCEPTION DU SON / MUSIC & SOUND DESIGN Diego Noguera ARTISTIEK ASSISTENT & KOSTUUMONTWERP / ASSISTANTE ARTISTIQUE & CONCEPTION COSTUMES / ARTISTIC ASSISTANT & COSTUME DESIGN Dina Dooreman MET / AVEC / WITH Hannah Berrada, Luna De Boos, Jurgen Delnaet SCENOGRAFIE & LIGHT ONTWERP / CONCEPTION LUMIÈRE & SCÉNOGRAPHIE / SET & LIGHTING DESIGN Andrés Poirot VISUAL DESIGNER / DESIGNER VISUELE Pablo Mois LICHTTECHNIEK / TECHNIQUE LUMIÈRES / LIGHT TECHNICS Dimi Stuyven GELUID / SON / SOUND Steven Lorie / Maarten Mees AUDIOVISUELE TECHNIEK / TECHNIQUE AUDIOVISUELLE / AUDIOVISUAL TECHNICS Gert Vanhyfte, Pier Gallen / Thibaud Decoene KLEEDSTER / COSTUMIÈRE/ DRESSER Nancy Colman, Heidi Ehrhart TONEELMEESTER / REGIE DE PLATEAU / STAGE MANAGER Dimi Stuyven PRODUCTIELEIDING / DIRECTEUR DE PRODUCTION / PRODUCTION MANAGER Robin Hectors VERTALING / TRADUCTION / TRANSLATION Anne Vanderschueren (FR), Michael De Cock (NL) BOVENTITELING / SURTITRAGE / SURTITLING Inge Floré PRODUCTIE / PRODUCTION KVS COPRODUCTIE / COPRODUCTION Fundación Teatro a Mil, La rose des vents - Scène Nationale Lille Métropole Villeneuve d’Ascq, Perpodium SPREIDING & TOURMANAGEMENT / DISTRIBUTION & DIRECTRICE DE TOURNÉE / DISTRIBUTION & TOUR DIRECTION Saskia Liénard MET DE STEUN VAN / AVEC LE SOUTIEN DE / WITH THE SUPPORT OF de Vlaamse Overheid, Région Hauts-de-France, Tax Shelter van de Belgische Federale Overheid via Cronos Invest