FEED © Kurt Hentschläger
A creation for the Theater Biennial Venice.
FEED is an immersive performance in which the audience is subjected to effects and shifting mood in an artificial environment without performers in the flesh. The piece goes through two seemingly opposite stages.
The first half of FEED, staged in a classical, frontal way, is misleading in relation to later events. In the beginning, in a single, larger than life projection, suspended 3D figures move, sometimes synchronized in their motions like one meta being, following a unified choreography. They simultaneously float and convulse in a zero gravity world, their movements generating sounds, to create a corresponding, symphonic drone.
The second part is a composition for artificial fog, pulse- and stroboscopic light, the combination inducing a complete loss of spatial orientation, without depth of field. A matching sound-scape infused by feedback and intense sub-low bass augments this impression, generates a heightened physical experience. FEED stresses the limits of perception. What evolves is a pure sensation of light projected directly onto the retinas of the spectators.
"FEED in title is a triple entendre, evoking at the same time an energy flow, a catheter tube and a rather primal form of ingestion ? if not cattle chow than at the very least what would have to be an undifferentiated form of gastronomy. As a performance work, Feed similarly conveys an equivalent array of references, portraying the death throes of a herd of humanoid clones, to reveal the nihilistic ideology underlying the shooter-game technology used to create them."
Claudia Hart, essay on FEED, 2006.
FEED by Kurt Hentschlager
Max & Unreal Scripting
Michael Ferraro
3D Modeling & Character Design
Francisco Narango
Thanks to
Claudia Hart & Friedrich Kirschner
Supported by
BUNDESKANZLERAMT : KUNST / Federal Chancellery Austria
LAND OBEROESTERREICH - KULTUR / Cultural Dept. State of Upper Austria
Commissioned by
THEATER BIENNIAL VENICE 2005
