2024

FLAT SUN

- an extended cinema experience, a concert and a performance.

In "Flat sun", Verdensteatret draws inspiration from the cyclical nature of energy and waste, in both human and non-human life. From ancient worship and sacrifice of shining and golden objects, to today's obsession with the extraction and production of value and waste. Flat Sun invites viewers to investigate what is an object and what is an abject, what is useful and what is empty, what is music and what is noise, what is radiant and what is dark. 

On the eve of the great operation, let your movement be guided by the sun. Study the relationship between light and life. Note that the plants absorb the far-red but reflect the infra-red. When the agave plant is fully grown it sends forth a giant stem the size of a telegraph pole. This signals that the plant is dying. Do not touch it other than with your eyes, but leave it as it is until the next day, the day of the operation. Start to cut it when the sun begins to rise in the hemisphere. The pole you take to a metal worker, who must forge the steel sharp enough to cut the throat of a sacrifice. Fasten the steel as covers for the ends of the pole. You then procure a loadstone, which you heat to magnetize the two steel points. Observe that the surroundings have started to act strange. The sun is a yellow metal disc. Hanging in space as a brass-shiny light. A slowly rotating golden coin. The invisible light is sieving into the visible. The firm ground becomes like the ocean. If you have performed all correctly your body will be unstable, silent movie-like. Let the flat sun fall over you.

Artistic team: Asle Nilsen, Ali Djabbary, Annike Flo, Elise Macmillan, Espen Sommer Eide, Janne Kruse and Torgrim Torve
Sound engineer: Linn Nystadnes
Executive producer: Martin Taxt

Thanks to: Laurent Ravot, Tobias Leira, Magnus Bugge, Niklas Adam, Leif Stangebye-Nielsen, Alex Bruck, Aleida Pérez, Natalia Pérez Turner, Jardín Escultórico Edward James, Las Pozas og Pedro y Elena Foundation

Supported by: Ministry of Culture and Equality, The Arts Council, Fund for Performing Artists, Bergesenstiftelsen