Ecstasy #1

Performance – Created by Sissy Doutsiou

A wandering on the dark side of the instinct, an exploration of patience, body and mind, an experience of breaking the constraints and doubts. The visitors choose the time duration of their staying on the space and they choose also the route of their wandering. _____ "Sissy Doutsiou guides the audience into more ‘hyper mapping’ into unpredictability. The experimental art performance feels more like a complex mathematical system or lab. experiment, rather than a theatre piece. The audience is allowed into the space in groups of ten and choose the route of their wandering through the darkened space, aided only by their phone lights. It contained for me elements of both Kalakathi dance and Artaudian Theatre of Cruelty and a delicate balance or pervading ‘harmony over chaos’ which Sissy Doutsiou’s rare kind of auteur vision reveals. A personal text (taped to A3 paper on the floor) accompany each actor’s stylized performative actions and helps to express for each their intuitive and creative innovation choices. A kind of needed meta-conceptual dénouement for what the audience had experienced in the main space i.e. the intense interweaving tropes of subjectivity with the impetus of protest. An ephemeral theatre experience it was indeed and felt it could last forever. The performers offer an astonishing experience with a performance that takes place in the dark room for more than two hours in a very deep, intense and ritualistic atmosphere. Combining hard-action body performance with written poetry and distraction of taboos the performers create a strong existential experience for the amazed audience." Michael Mantas - Film Direcector Performers: Dimosthenis Halkias, John Voulgaris, Panagiotis Ber, Konstantina Baka-Fili, LU, Ifigeneia Antonidou, Evagelia Papantoniou, Nikolas Papoulias