Remaining Strangers (2020)
Performance & Creation: Jen Rosenblit, Gary Wilmes
Concept & Direction: Simone Aughterlony
Music: Hahn Rowe
Dramaturgical Advice: Saša Božic, Jorge León, Felipe Ribeiro
Set Designer: Thibault van Craenenbroeck
Costume Designer: Nathalie Pallandre, Thibault van Craenenbroeck
Light Design: Joseph Wegmann
Technical Director: Marie Prédour
Production: Sina Kießling
Distribution: ART HAPPENS.be
Production: Verein für allgemeines Wohl
Coproduction: HAU Hebbel am Ufer - Berlin, Arsenic Centre d’art scénique contemporain - Lausanne, Gessnerallee - Zurich
Supported by: City of Zurich, Canton of Zurich Fachstelle Kultur and Pro Helvetia - Swiss Cultural Foundation, Migros Kulturprozent, Interpreten Foundation, Anne Marie Schindler Foundation, The Invisible Dog Art Center - New York, NATIONALES PERFORMANCE NETZ Coproduction Fund for Dance, which is funded by the Federal Government Commissioner for Culture and the Media
Simone Aughterlony returns with an elaboration of the guest/host relation and all that ensues: Notions of the Stranger quickly emerge as those present get involved in recognizable social situations like a dinner party with a DJ and toasting farewell to the things that we have already lost. Folding chairs in constant rearrangement suggest a locality and momentary belonging until we realize the resources are becoming few and largely repurposed. Especially now, how can we consider the very place we are without the binds of ownership? How can we re-approach or land back to something that was never ours yet simply held us for an epoch of time? Acknowledging the infinite difference between people, “Remaining Strangers” hovers amongst the endurance of the return and the discord located in the fiber of not being able to.