“Occupying Eden” is a, multi-species performance in which an imagined ecological paradise is co-created. Guided somatic sessions invite the audience to connect with plants through their senses and set the mood for the performance of the vegetative choreography. Set partially outdoors, the work portrays different substrates of the notion of garden inextricably linked to a white, western paradigm and attempts to compost that frame. Through plant inspired processes such as pollination, symbiosis and decay, the workers and facilitators of Occupying Eden transform physically- revealing layers of self -in the attempt to explore the physical peripheries of our performed relationship with plants. From gardener proletariat, to activist, storyteller, and queer botanical fashionista – Solène Weinachter and Fernando Balsera take the audience on a sensorial journey into versions of Eden accompanied by an original soundtrack by Jan and Tal Hendrickse. Influenced by drum and base, voguing and invoking a celebration of the non-binary and reciprocal relationship we have with our photosynthesising allies: Occupying Eden is a movement play in eight parts containing multiplicities of human and non-human parts. A subscendence of organic matter.
Direction/Concept/Choreography: Rosalind Masson
Collaborators: Solène Weinachter, Fernando Balsera, Florence Freitag
Design: Chell Young
Sound: Jan & Tal Hendrickse
Production Assistant & Plant Costume Design: Irina Steinbrecher
