Uro/Mangel

(Unrest/Lack)

Solo.

Premiere: 26th January 2005, Dansescenen, Copenhagen.


Uro/Mangel is a collage of disquieting moods on the brink of a nightmare. In the piece Anders Christiansen continues his quest to combine installation art with dance theatre. The scene is set with an old wooden crib, a pile of earth, flickering light bulbs and three man-sized rag dolls.


Concept, choreography and dance: Anders Christiansen
Music: Jakob Brandt-Pedersen, The Creatures, Sounds of the Earth, Anton Weber, W. Earl Brown, Siouxsie and the Banshees
Set and costume design: Lise Klitten
Lighting design: Michael Breiner
Sound design: Jakob Brandt-Pedersen
Producer / PR: Lars Vind-Andersen, Paw Petersen, Ulla Katrine Friis
Production: (Stillleben)

Minimum stage measurements: 10 metres deep x 12 metres wide
Duration:44 minutes




Press quotes: Strange sights…
“Again the slow, insistent movements, the demonstrative display of the body, posing. At times almost floating, with his expressionless face turned towards us. Arms, legs and torso create curving, calligraphic signs in the twilight.
Simultaneously, flickering light bulbs fly around the dark room like fluttering fireflies, whilst the sea rages and thumping beats are replaced by classical music.

Later he explores the space, opening up a large sack of soil onto the floor, and as he roots around in it, the cold stage is transformed into a small garden. Or he drags on life-sized rag dolls, sits them on chairs and imitates their movements, until finally he pupates himself - once again - this time into a white rag doll. It is bizarre, yet beautiful. What it is all about or where we are going I can’t be sure of. But I know I’d like to take the same journey.”
Henrik Lyding (Jyllands-Posten, 1st February 2005)







”Nobody examines his own set design like 41 year old Anders Christiansen! In the evening’s main event, the 40-minute long newly choreographed solo, Uro/Mangel, we see him rocking an empty crib. However, Christiansen sits far from the crib, and its not a loving hand that rocks the cradle, but a long blue rope reminiscent of an umbilical cord. An image of the uncomfortable distance and dejection, which the choreographer ponders. With his naked torso under his black suit, Christiansen is the lost child, but also it’s metaphysical consciousness.

It is this mixture of narrative levels in Anders Christiansen’s work that makes his style so intense and recognizable. We, as an audience, feel like the witnesses to an experiment which cannot unambiguously be identified as either horror or comedy.”
Janus Kodal (Politiken, 29th January 2005)







“And completely in line with his earlier work, the universe is mysterious and bizarre. At the same time sensitive and brutal. Painful and yet funny.
With his dark suit and bare torso, crawling across the floor, his outstretched and vulnerable bird-like arm movements, and his faint melancholic glance, Anders Christiansen is a combination of child, woman and man. His characteristic non-dance language is assisted by flickering, glowing lights that cut light beams across the space and the sound of a baby’s cries, mixed with wind, bird cries and so on.

The sense of unrest and lack is powerful. From the opening scene where Anders Christiansen rocks a wooden crib from afar by pulling on a thick blue rope, to the scene where he tentatively sculpts babies out of soil. Finishing with an imitation and re-interpretation of the body language of three large white rag dolls, then pupating into a white suit to become a doll himself.”
Kirsten Dahl (Århus Stiftstidende, 19th February 2005)







Venues: Ateneum Hall, Helsinki, Finland, 5 October 2007.
Teaterhuset, Odense, 26 April 2005.
Tobaksgaarden, Assens, 26 February 2005.
Teatret Møllen, Haderslev, 24 February 2005.
Kultur Huset at Toftlund Højskole, 22 February 2005.
Entré scenen, Århus, 17-19 February 2005.
Dansescenen, Copenhagen, 8 February 2005 (tour version).
Dansescenen, Copenhagen, 26 January - 5 February 2005 (double programme with Solo om æg og forpupning).


Uro/Mangel was produced with support from The Danish Arts Council, The State Arts Foundation, Danmarks Nationalbanks jubilæumsfond, Augustinus Fonden, Wilhelm Hansen Fonden, Knud Højgaards Fond.



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Photographs: Christoffer Askman
In all pictures: Anders Christiansen