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Lux - Opus Dei

Lux - Opus Dei (2003) was a production by Kulturproduksjoner and Hedmark and Oppland Diocese.

Lux - Opus Dei was produced as part of the celebration of Hamar Diocese's 850 year anniversary in 2003. The production was an outdoors wandering theatre performance, with 250 participants: Professionals and amateurs, actors, singers, dancers, choir and priests.

Information

(Objekt ID 27024)
Object type Production
Premiere January 6, 2003
Produced by Kulturproduksjoner
Audience Adults, Youth
Language Norwegian
Keywords Theatre, Wandering Theatre, Dance, Music
Running period January 6, 2003  
Website Kulturproduksjoner
More

At the webpage of Kulturproduksjoner the following, among other things, is written about Lux - Opus Dei:

"Kulturproduksjoner was contacted, asked to make a production to initiate the 850 year anniversary of Hamar Diocese in 2003.

The production was performed Three Kings' Day, January 6, and was a gift to the whole Diocese from the municipality of Hamar.

(...)

In glimpses the audience met the church's long history along the performance path along Mjøsstranda, from our contemporary times to the time when the representative of the Pope declared 'Hammer' as the Diocese centre in the Lord's year of 1153.

The perspective on humans, the understanding of history and the choice of values in times of change and battles filled with differences, throughout a widely differing gallery of characters, such as Køhn, Schelderup, Hauge, Bjørnson, Pontoppidan, Luther, Galilei, popes and cardinals, choirs of monks and nuns, teachers and priests punishing schools and confirmation youth, pilgrims searching for a hospital, construction workers, beggars, soldiers, farmers, flagellants, herbal remedy wives and jesters...

Surrounded by the cold of the winter night, by torches and flaming bonfires meant for heretics, screams from the persecuted, drums and white steppes across the ice.

Lux - Opus Dei is built from smaller scenes, monologues, tableaus and installations, repeated as the audience passes by, in a kind of simultaneous dramaturgy. In expression the production is related to the wandering theatre of Medieval Times, and with contemporary performance art and land art traditions."

Sources:

E-mail from Karen Høie/Kulturproduksjoner, 03.01.2012

Kulturproduksjoner, kulturprod.no, 28.02.2012, http://www.kulturprod.no/index.php/tidligere-forestillinger/Vandreteater/110-lux-opus-dei

Contributors (8)
Name Role
Svein Gundersen (teater) – Script
Svein Gundersen (teater) – Direction
Bjørg Thorsen – Choreography
Svein Gundersen (teater) – Stage design
Ola Jevnaker – Costume
Karen Høie – Actor
Asle Berteig – Producer
Karen Høie – Producer
Performance dates
January 6, 2003Mjøsstranda Worldwide premiere
Press coverage

Liv Simensen, 07.01.2003, Hamar Arbeiderblad [Hamar]:
"At Koigen, where we started the wandering, our time's shopping carts were standing in ice-cold, expensive electric light, some of them filled to the brim with all we can buy for money, some empty - for instance those with posters saying 'love thy neighbour'. No human screamed, but no one said anything nice, either. Powerless and excluded many have been throughout the church history, as well as secular history, more and more the further down the centuries we go. That makes it a strong sight to see, that eleven headless bishop men stand as symbols of the gentleman bishops who did not want Rosemarie Køhn to join the board, and to hear her own hoarse voice read the words she was met with the first time she met the male bishops: 'You are a pain for the church. You are a woman'."

Espen Solli, 07.01.2003, Hamar Dagblad [Hamar]:
"Lux - Opus Dei was a grandioso and brave celebration of the 850 year anniversary of Hamar Diocese, with a brave, critical look at the Church's role throughout history. Curious and celebrative wanderers yesterday got a historical wandering they will not forget very soon. The script writer, director and stage designer Svein Gundersen made with Hamar Diocese a grandioso celebration - sated with content and mood. But also with a critical flashback on a church that hasn't always been so including or tolerant towards fellow humans."