Folds of subjectivity
Oleg Soulimenko and the PARASOL dance group (performers Nadine Mathis, Julia Müllner, Oneka von Schrader and Yuwol June C.) have invited us to a picnic. It takes place in Hall G at Tanzquartier Wien. Like many others, I accepted the invitation. After all, the title The weather is nice, let’s picnic suggests a lively atmosphere. On several levels at once, in fact: mentally, ecologically and socially. Three times nice weather, three ecologies[1], three good reasons for a picnic.
Hall G is full. Some of the audience sit facing, others on the stage. “Let’s walk on the wild side!”, we hear one of the performers shout to the audience, while one piece of cloth after the other is placed on the dance floor. Layer by layer. A thousand plateaus.[2] The cloths and blankets are woven from a great variety of materials that come in a wide range of patterns. Lines, images, the word “HOME” is printed on one piece of cloth. After a while, the fabrics cover most of the stage floor. Only a few folds upset the smoothness of their surfaces. The floor, or rather the ground has been prepared for the picnic. There is chatting, an exchange of everyday banalities. “I hope this email finds you well”, “I don’t know who ate my ice cream”, “Where is my Tesla?”. The state of emergency[3] seems far away. From time to time, however, the world of everyday life is left behind through language: “How many days does this war last already?” The distant war is here, but the normality of the picnic prevails. And yet. Sometimes the state of emergency intrudes. For example, when the performers wrap themselves in the cloths and blankets. When they hide in them or under them, take cover, conceal themselves, creep away, veil themselves, hole themselves up. To the point of invisibility, of unrecognisability.
This cryptic game of hiding, of taking cover, of concealment, of holing oneself up is what Oleg Soulimenko and the four performers present to us in poetic images and folds this evening.
Meanwhile, it has become dark in Hall G. A new plateau opens up. One that slumbers in the depths of night. Mercedes, Tesla, Haus des Meeres Aqua Terra Zoo, David Bowie, Lady Gaga, banal fantasies haunt the performers. They are expressions of the banality of the collective imaginary[4]. Oh! The world of our hunting parties seems even more fantastic awake than in dreams. Day after day. They chase after dreams with their eyes open.
Conversely, silence falls on the theatre hall. Only faint sounds can be heard for a moment before they die away. They emanate from the singing, mumbling performers. Placidity fills the room. It is only at dawn that a roaring and booming gradually awakens from hidden depths. It takes its time to find its way into a linguistic order.
The lights are on again in Hall G. There is a blue tarpaulin among the pile, like the ones we know from dwellings of the homeless. They protect against rain and wet conditions. “Shelter” was one of the words uttered this evening. We, too, know it from childhood. Houses made of cloths, blankets and tarpaulins where we hid our treasures. To become nameless, faceless, anonymous, utterly de-subjectified for once?[5] Indeed, one can hide behind a thousand plateaus. Individually or collectively. Singular-plural.[6]
One of the performers pulls a large white silk cloth from the pile. It is then spread out directly in the audience’s line of sight. As if we were sitting in the cave of Plato’s allegory,[7] the shadows of the performers now pass before the veiled eyes of the audience. Simulacra, illusions, phantasms.[8] A little later, one of the performers starts waving a yellow piece of cloth vigorously, nailing their colours to the flag. With peaceful intentions, possibly. Possibly not.
Once again, silence falls on Hall G. The pile of cloths and blankets moves. The bodies folded into it rear up like a monster and move together across the stage. One of the performers sits down on the sculpture and starts to ride it. She sits calmly on top; with a harmonica; regal.
At the end, the four performers find themselves pulling one cloth after the other from the pile again, laying each of them on the floor, one on top of the other. One layer, a second layer, a third, a fourth. Hysterical laughter blends with the heaped layers (of historical becomings) until finally all four of them have disappeared into their self-constructed lair of fluffy cloths.
It is a poetic journey through a thousand plateaus that you leave behind as you depart from the picnic.
References:
[1] Félix Guattari, The Three Ecologies, translated by Ian Bindar and Paul Sutton, London/New Brunswick 2000 (orig. 1989).
[2] Gilles Deleuze and Félix Guattari, A Thousand Plateaus. Capitalism and Schizophrenia, translated by Gabriel Massumi, Minneapolis/London 1987 (orig. 1980).
[3] Giorgio Agamben, Homo sacer. Sovereign Power and Bare Life, translated by Daniel Heller-Roazen, Stanford 1998 (orig. 1995).
[4] Cornelius Castoriadis, The Imaginary Institution of Society, translated by Kathleen Blamey, Cambridge/Malden 2005 (1987) (orig. 1975).
[5] Gilles Deleuze and Félix Guattari, What is Philosophy?, translated by Hugh Tomlinson and Graham Burchell III., New York 1996 (orig. 1991).
[6] Jean-Luc Nancy, Being Singular Plural, translated by Robert Richardson and Anne O’Byrne, Stanford 2000 (orig. 1996).
[7] Plato, Republic, translated by G. M. A. Grube (1974), revised by C. D. C. Reeve, Cambridge, MA 1992.
[8] Jean Baudrillard, Simulacra and Simulation, translated by Sheila F. Glaser, Michigan 1994 (orig. 1981).
Arno Böhler teaches philosophy at the University of Vienna, Institute of Philosophy and the University of Music and Performing Arts Vienna. He is the founder of the philosophy performance festival Philosophy On Stage and project leader of the PEEK project (AR 822) “Philosophie der Kunst: Kunst der Philosophie”, funded by the Austrian Science Fund (FWF) 2024‒2027. Grant DOI: 10.55776/AR822. More information at: homepage.univie.ac.at/arno.boehler/php/