AGON

age recommendation: 12+
after the show: 19:00 After Talk held in Polish (no translation)

In Greek Ag?n means ?conflict?, ?fight?. It?s a term used by the ancient Greeks for a situation in which sides disputed in order to show their superiority over the opponent, or, alternatively, the superiority of their arguments. The term was also used for a type of festival in honour of a god or a hero.

In AGON, which is achoreographic monodrama, Dominka Knapik talks about jobs ?for a lifetime?: that of an artist and of a mother. At the same time, she stands and fights with her own biography of a workaholic choreographer who struggles with the eternal sense of guilt a busy mother feels in relation to her child. Her companion in this fight is an acute observer: Pytia the choreotherapist. Both artists work with highly personal material, which is detonated by the self-mocking form of a mockdocumentary (?fake documentary?). It results in distanced, embedded narrative which mirrors the performativity of representation: thanks to it the audience can move ahead into the artist?s future while at the same time going back in her biography. The effect is a critical, but humorous study of the sense of having an (artistic) career and combining it with motherhood.

Director and choreographer, performance: Dominika Knapik
Text and dramaturgy: Patrycja Kowańska
Space, lighting design, video: Wolfgang Macher
Sound design: Justyna Stasiowska
Costumes, objects: Natalia Mleczak
Production: Teatr Łaźnia Nowa w Krakowie
Cooperation: Schauspielhaus Bochum
Photos: Klaudyna Schubert
Graphic: Victor Soma
Premiere: 7.12.2020, Kraków, Poland

Photo above: ?Klaudyna Schubert