Gothenburg Fringe 2022 in review - Journey to the Kingdom of Hypnos, A Simple Misunderstanding, Dead People Are Liking Things on Facebook
Ceri Taylor was one of our star volunteers at this year’s Fringe, diving straight into helping us after arriving in town for an exchange year from Plymouth. Alongside working hard throughout the Fringe, Ceri made sure to catch a variety of performances during the week and has compiled a series of reviews. Enjoy the first batch below.
Journey to the Kingdom of Hypnos by Carmel Clavin
Can you put on a blindfold? Can you wear a headset? Can you call asleep? Good. Then you can come to the show.
The beauty of the Gothenburg Fringe Festival is the variety of art and talent on show. With over 150 events and performers to choose from it is simply not possible to see them all. This one, however, I saw as a must.
Journey to the Kingdom of Hypnos is an exploration of the senses. If you are brave enough to let go, to give up control, to relax and let the gloriously rich dulcet tones of Mnemosyne guide you to the ancient kingdom. Accompanied by sounds, smells and the power of our minds we delve deep into our unconscious minds unbound by the restraints of our physical forms.
This is a show you have to experience yourself to really appreciate the content. I can tell you to close your eyes and I can tell you to imagine that you are on a dark sea and I can tell you all the things our guide asked us to do but until you try it for yourself you will never quite see it. Because every single one of us will be taken on a different journey inspired by different events, with different origins, which ultimately creates a unique show for every person involved.
What will your journey look like? Will you board the ship?
Journey to the Kingdom of Hypnos | Photo: Uros Hocevar / kolektiff
A Simple Misunderstanding by Zander Constant, Zach Enquist and Rachel McNamee
Recall a memory. Any memory. A memory of good times, sad times, memories that fill you with nostalgia or memories that you wish would get the hint and fade away. Take a moment to think about this: are you remembering the thing that happened, or are you remembering the last time you remembered it?
Dancers Zach Enquist and Rachel McNamee take this multi-layered concept and give it new life in this moving and beautifully executed piece, A Simple Misunderstanding. The same event - a breakup - told from two different perspectives through the medium of interpretive dance and zombie apocalypse reenactments showcase the subtle nuances each person gives to one memory, how one person can somehow perceive one event with such difference and the impossible task of finding common ground within that emotional minefield.
Performed in the cluttered space of PanJál Scentstudio surrounded by other patrons sitting on the stairs or perching on top of equipment cases gave this piece a wonderfully intimate feel to this piece. Performed in front of a wall showing its naked bricks, wedged in between tripods and lighting rigs, contrasting to the quietly understated white slip and black blazer, this show conjured up far more emotions as an audience member than I originally anticipated.
Dancers don’t always need music to be effective on stage and Zach and Rachel certainly prove that as most of their choreography takes place to the soundtrack of their own spoken word. As recent and well-deserved winners of the Nordic Fringe Network award, catch them and their chaotic good impressions at other Nordic Fringe Festivals very soon!
A Simple Misunderstanding | Photo: Sophia Kontopoulou
Dead People Are Liking Things on Facebook by RTC
All of us are living through the digital age. Whether you remember the days of Walkmans and VHS tapes or if you know one of your first sentences included the word ‘Alexa’, it is largely assumed that most people will one day activate a social media account...
Chris Dupuis takes this unwritten rule one existential step further in his just-shower-thoughts piece entitled Dead People Are Liking Things on Facebook.
Facebook does not know you’re dead. Tagging a passed-over friend on Facebook brings them back into the present tense with a jarring ‘is’. Chris Dupuis ‘is’ with the Gothenburg Fringe Festival. Facebook cannot tell the difference between life and death.
Chris brings on an incredibly brave and vulnerable journey to scroll through this idea with him, backlit by the glare of a projection screen showing people he really knew in his own life who have sadly passed on, yet are still alive and kicking through the algorithmic powers that be. Chris gives us an intimate look into each one of these profiles and the life of the person in the picture in a totally honest and endearingly comedic encouragement to ponder some of the most unanswerable questions. What does that say about death? Do we ever really die, do we ever really get to go to heaven and receive that eternal rest, can we ever really move on if we are immortalised forever through our various outlets all over social media?
I don’t suppose we’ll ever know, just as we’ll never know whether telephone psychics are pulling tarot cards or using basic common sense. Will drag queens ever be on time? Is it true that everyone needs to have a vice? Will we exist the way we knew ourselves in heaven or the way we were remembered in our lifetime?
Go watch this show if you find these ideas interesting, and maybe you can figure it out for yourself.
Chris Dupuis prepares for Dead People Are Liking Things on Facebook | Photo: Uros Hocevar / kolektiff