2020

agon

Teatr Łaźnia Nowa

Agon is a choreographic monodrama.

[Greek. Agṓn‘conflict’, ‘fight’] – term used by the ancient Greeks for a situation in which sides dis– puted in order to show their superiority over the opponent, or, alternatively, the superiority of their arguments. The term was also used for a type of festival in honour of a god or a hero.

Dominka Knapik returns onto the stage as a performer to talk about jobs “for a lifetime”: that of an artist and of a mother. At the same time she stands and fights with her own biography of a workaholic choreographer who struggles with the eternal sense of guilt a busy mother feels in relation to her child. Her companion in this fight is an acute observer: Pytia the choreotherapist. Both artists work with highly personal material, which is detonated by the self-mocking form of a mockdocumentary (“fake documentary”). It results in distanced, embedded narrative which mirrors the performativity of representation: thanks to it the audience can move ahead into the artist’s future while at the same time going back in her biography. The effect is a critical, but humorous study of the sense of having an (artistic) career and combining it with moterhood.

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Polish mother dancing, brave and constantly blaming herself for not giving her son enough time. A brilliant performance by Dominika Knapik, full of emotion, motherly warmth and a woman’s struggle with herself.

And I’m Fulfilled / Paweł Kluszczyński
 

Director and choreographer, performance: Dominika Knapik
Text and dramaturgy: Patrycja Kowańska
Space, lighting design, video: Wolfgang Macher
Sound design: Justyna Stasiowska
Costumes, objects: Natalia Mleczak
Stage manager: Monika Weis

Production: Teatr Łaźnia Nowa w Krakowie
Cooperation: Schauspielhaus Bochum

Photos: Klaudyna Schubert

Graphic: Victor Soma

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