Alexandra Bachzetsis Play

Alexandra Bachzetsis (b1974, lives and works in Basel) is a performance artist and choreographer and for some time now she has also been appearing with her work in the context of art. Her inventions oscillate constantly between dance performance and the demands of art. In the Kunsthaus Glarus she is showing two works where this interdisciplinary aspect and the interaction between object, body and space are especially emphasised. Her work Secret Instructions is a collaboration with the graphic designer Julia Born. It consists of six scripts for plays, a printed programme, which is handed out to the audience, and a performance, which is put on once. The stage instructions for movements within the space are from six different twentieth-century plays by Edward Albee, Samuel Beckett, Berthold Brecht, Anton Chekhov, Sarah Kane and Harold Pinter and are the main focus on the stage. In the script, all the spoken texts have been deleted so that only the instructions for movement on the stage remain. One result is that different styles of the playwrights regarding stage movement become visible. Another is that the instructions become freely interpretable for the actors and produce no fixed dramaturgy. Only the movement sequences relating to the objects that are used in the plays determine the choreography. Transcription, translation and interpretation of language – both being basic supports for choreography and graphic design – are at the centre. The project is made up of a trilogy of performances, which have already been shown at De Brakke Grond in Amsterdam and the Theaterhaus Gessnerallee in Zurich and are now guest performances in the context of art in the Kunsthaus Glarus. In addition, Alexandra Bachzetsis is also showing a new video work entitled Rehearsal (Ungoing). Everyday objects are subjected to physical alterations. Here again the focus is on movement sequences, alterations of states, a mysterious choreography and a certain theatrical element.