Spicy girls from the Hare Hill
"Dziewczęta z Zajęczego Wzgórza" (Girls from the Hare Hill) with choreography by Krzysztof Leon Dziemaszkiewicz and Anna Steller in Patrz Mi Na Usta Theatre in Gdańsk.
Brutality, aggression and BDSM elements constitute the strongest emotional load of the performance of Patrz Mi Na Usta Theatre entitled “Dziewczęta z Zajęczego Wzgórza” (Girls of the Hare’s Hill). Krzysztof “Leon” Dziemaszkiewicz and Anna Steller decided to challenge the reality experienced by each of us every day and involving each of us, even if we are not aware of it happening.
The audience cannot feel comfortable in the cold, earthy hall of the Gdańsk Institute of Art Wyspa. On the nearly bare stage, a living-room sofa attracts our attention. Somewhere on its side, a portable fluorescent lamp sheds some cold light; there are a cheap motel’s lights in the background. There are also two leafless branches there, between the stage and the audience. At the border of the acting space, there is a live video projection. The camera’s eye is directed at the audience – the beginning of the recording is the beginning of the performance whose heroes include the audience caught in the eye of the camera.
Dziemaszkiewicz likes to surprise and raise extreme contradicting emotions in the audience. This time is no different: he succeeds in building dramatic tension. But in “Dziewczęta z Zajęczego Wzgórza”, he stays in Anna Steller’s shadow practically all the time. Anna Steller presents very good dancing skills. She shows an artistic struggle with herself, an attempt to break free from the knots that tie up her body. But the spectators will see no smooth or moving story.
Just as the hand-steered music, the artists of the show (closer to performance art rather than a dance theatre) are undergoing a metamorphosis. Steller transforms into a ruthless torturer and with a camera terrorizes Dziemaszkiewicz tied up with electric tape and hidden behind a ghastly mask. Dziemaszkiewicz’s body is deprived this way of identity and exposed to public view by projecting his silhouette on the wall. Brutality, aggression and BDSM elements constitute the strongest emotional load of the spectacle and a reference to the esthetics of performance art and scandalizing video art of the Katowice-based group Suka Off.
The latest work by Patrz Mi Na Usta Theatre is rich in strong images. Cooperation on the stage gives rise to a battle, self-struggle (manifested in a demonic-mechanic tango) as rivalry changes into attempts to dominate the partner. There’s little dance in it, and more movement, sometimes in mere outlines, which speaks for itself. On the downside, there’s the repeated group choreography, constituting evidently the seams of the performance, in contrast with the well though-out solo scenes and images composed together. Another drawback is the big blue blank screen, irritating when the camera is off.
The addition of a background set design as a counterpoint to the events taking place in the foreground of the stage is nothing new. The camera, which came to our theatre on a wave of admiration for the German theatre, quickly became such a trite means of expression – so difficult to use “wisely”. But Dziemaszkiewicz and Steller succeeded in turning this rather banal means of expression into a significant stage tool.
The latest performance by Patrz Mi Na Usta Theatre is an interesting proposal for fans of Krzysztof “Leon” Dziemaszkiewicz and his theatre. In a duet with Anna Steller, Dziemaszkiewicz creates a theatre that manages more than just to provoke the audience with nudity or to show “man in crisis”. Is Leon’s theatre showing elements of the new coming to it?
