An imaginary future, in which the purposes and necessity of the human body are put into question, creates the departure point for Colette Sadler's new work. Learning from the Future operates within a science-fiction-like setting inhabited by BODY A. This futuristic body is regarded ambiguously as being "alive", but also as a highly sophisticated machine which possesses no self-awareness and cannot distinguish between inner-intention and external impulses.

The fictionality of BODY A is taken as a poetic means to speculate on an inconceivable reality where ever accelerating flows of information and encoded data could dictate the manner in which bodies move and function. Such a condition subverts the idea of self-agency. The performer's body in this piece is taken as a mere container - a channel. It can be filled and emptied. It allows information to pass through it.

Learning from the Future wishes to reflect on the replacement of the living body with the properties of the inanimate as well as with the virtuality of its post-human representation. The choreography uses movement to amplify the primitive power of bodies against the background of their dematerialization and disappearance.

CHOREOGRAPHY Colette Sadler PERFORMANCE Leah Marojevic MUSIC Brendan Dougherty LIGHT Samuli Laine VIDEO Mikko Gaestel OBJECT Mathis Burandt / neue tische COSTUME Eyal Meistel DRAMATURGY Assaf Hochman PRODUCTION MANAGEMENT Mira Moschallski

A production by Colette Sadler / Stammer Production and Dance4 / Arts Council of England. Funded by Creative Scotland. Supported by residencies at TanzHaus Zürich and Bora-Bora Aarhus. Media partner: taz. die tageszeitung

Photo © Mikko Gaestel