DATA OCEAN THEATRE / PART 1
TRAGEDY & THE GODDEXXES
TRAGEDY & THE GODDEXXES* (after Sourvinou-Inwood's reference text Tragedy and the Gods) is a constellation-like cluster of works corresponding to the first part of the five-year project Data Ocean Theatre.
Each of the five episodes (pieces-installations-performances) of Tragedy & the Goddexxes, corresponding to the successive structural parts of an ancient Greek tragedy, looks at the double dynamic of submersion in relation to a chosen marine figure/creature, borrowed from Finnish, Greek, and Basque animist mythologies (Amphitrite, Iku-Turso, Aallotaret, Itxaslamina), and in relation to experiments on sea-specific scenographic thinking.
Tragedy & the Goddexxes assembles an alternative pantheon for a queer and techno-animist speculative reset of the «contemporary tragic», where drama-creatures multiform at the intersection of syncretic mythology and the ambiguities of «technology-as-monster» narratives.
The simultaneous forces and fragilities of the transforming sea ecosystems meet the growing algorithmic-conditioned life and the crossbreeding of diverse art forms and research fields to make appear, disappear, and reappear, fluid sce(sea)nographies as imaginary prototypes for the societal constructions to come.
Diving into the "oceanic" as a dramaturgical model of inquiring, staging, forming, sensing and making senses, is an invitation to project the commons through opaque depths, radical otherness, and unknowability, guided by a few mythological technoaquatic beasts, whose chants, shapeshifts, and wet-glitches are signals to enter stages of other possible worlds.
Data Ocean Theatre is conducted in dialogue with the Finnish Meteorological Institute Marine Research Unit.
Data Ocean Theatre is supported by Kone Foundation, Taike-Arts Promotion Centre Finland, Pengerkatu 7 Työhuone, Tutke/Performing Arts Research Centre (Uniarts Helsinki)
*Goddex=gender-neutral for god/goddess
Episodes of Tragedy & the Goddexxes:
Data OceanTheatre / Tragedy & the Goddexxes / I. PROLOGOS ▶
August 2021 Pengerkatu 7 Työhuone, Helsinki
Data OceanTheatre / Tragedy & the Goddexxes / II. PARODOS ▶
Dec. 2021, Group show Ebb and Flow (Cur. RiikkaThitz), Kuva/Tila, Helsinki
Data OceanTheatre / Tragedy & the Goddexxes / III. EPEISODION ▶
March 2022, Tutke-Performing Arts Research Centre, Helsinki
Data OceanTheatre / Tragedy & the Goddexxes / IV. STASIMON ▶
August 2021 Pengerkatu 7 Työhuone, Helsinki
Data OceanTheatre / Tragedy & the Goddexxes / V. KOMMOS
Nov. 2022 TitanikGallery, Turku
Data OceanTheatre / Tragedy & the Goddexxes / VI. EXODOS
Publication/Performance-lecture, December 2023