Premiere of Alia Hamdan's performance in Lisbon
After Alija Hamdan's three-month residency in Zagreb, through the exchange program with Akademie Schloss Solitude, the play that was prepared during that period was premiered at the Alkantara Festival in Lisbon, November 19 and 20.
A woman is in a coma since the Beirut Port explosion. What happens when time freezes?
In contrast to previous episodes of violence in Beirut, the explosion of 4 August 2020 affected the city as a whole, in one single instant. Even though the event was immense, it did not cut time in half – there were no political changes, no resignations, no justice. The shift in Lebanese politics towards a state of corrupted peace, towards collapse and entropic degradation, became explicit.
The performance "The body is here, off screen" is an attempt to depict the frozen temporality generated by this event and made all the more acute by the recent Israeli attacks in Lebanon. On stage, a live performer stands motionless next to her subtle double, while a voice narrates the uncanny experience of time in coma.
Written and directed: Alia Hamdan
Performer: Silvija Dogan
Conceptual research advisor/Script and Scenography concepts: Fares Chalabi
Production assistant: Maissa Maatouk
Filming, editing and sound/ Theatre assistant: Veno Musinovic
Commissioned by The Consortium Commissions — an initiative of Mophradat, in partnership with Alkantara and Kaaitheater.
