Maybe Forever

In 2007 Philipp Gehmacher and Meg Stuart spent five days together in a dance studio. The result of these five days of improvisation-based dialogue was shown to a small audience. Those who saw it spoke of "an enchanting chemistry between these two dancer-choreographers". The "conversation" yielded so much mutual recognition that there was a pressing need to continue it. The result could be enjoyed at Oktoberdans in 2008.

Vampires struggle with eternity and loneliness. Human beings struggle with each other and with the fact that things are not forever. Everyone struggles with something in the end, and fortunately there are songs that make us feel better about it all. Maybe Forever is the collaborative piece in which choreographers Meg Stuart and Philipp Gehmacher let their artistic worlds bleed into one another. The songs of the Brussels-based singer-songwriter Niko Hafkenscheid, who joins them on stage, invite them to waltz to lullabies and into promised lands. But under the velvet surface of a sweet melancholy simmer the unexpressed and the embryonic.

In a set made by Janina Audick, reminiscent of concert halls, cinema theatres, and even crematoria, Stuart and Gehmacher look like tiny figurines in a play that wavers between dreams and wishes, mourning and meeting. The album of Maybe Forever flips through relational snapshots, expressive moods and declarations that speak of the impermanence of life. How do we let the lifespan of things extend beyond their predicted deadlines?

"I try to exercise loss, but that does not necessarily mean that I am able to accept it." Rivane Neuenschwander

As opposed to Stuart's earlier works, Maybe Forever seems to be simply a story of lost love. The narrative is driven forward in a montage of flashbacks, an effect often seen in the movies to be able to dwell on what has already taken place. But opposed to the movies, the movement, rather than the lines or the dramaturgy, is the focal point.

The small gestures and the intricate movements show a fascination Stuart long has held for the body’s own expression of an inner emotional presence. The two dancers provide a beautiful interpretation of the different stages of love, where they time and again seek comfort in a song, performed by Niko Hafkenscheid, reviving the emotions which were once for real.

Sources:

BIT Teatergarasjen, Oktoberdans 2008 and the program of the performance. 10.08.2010: http://www.bit-teatergarasjen.no -archive