Onde Eventyr* (Evil Fairytales)

Onde Eventyr* (Evil Fairytales) was an internal research project in which Teater NOR wanted to try out different elements the members had long discussed and wanted to test out practically.

Teater NOR wanted to give Ragnhild Lie a free rein and to work partly on her conditions. She was asked to make a sculpture or an object Teater NOR could relate to and work with. This object should be uniquely hers as a first idea to the staging venue, a condition upon which the opportunities and the limitations for the rest of the creative process should be laid.

She made a large yellow/white latex membrane which was hung in the middle of the room. The assignment of Teater NOR was to create with a foundation in this object. This was a new experience for the performers, whose work in the room had always before been the foundation for how the room was created. The artists from Teater NOR used the latex membrane to divide the room in two parts, they dressed in it, created shadows on it and projected video on it. They experienced that the membrane held a powerful force in the room, and that many of the spontaneous ideas from the performers simply did not work with it. It became some kind of battle between two means of expression, developing into an equal-footing meeting for eventually to take the shape of a united whole.

This meeting between two means of expression and Teater NOR’s learning process connected to it, was the main point in making Onde Eventyr. The work was never developed into a complete production, and it was only performed once as a work demonstration for a local audience. Still the company regarded it as a useful process, and the artists have taken many fragments of this work into later works.

Quote from Friedrich Nietzsche: "The will to truth, which is still going to tempt us to many a daring exploit, that celebrated truthfulness of which all philosophers up to now have spoken with respect, what questions this will to truth has already set down before us! What strange, serious, dubious questions! There is already a long history of that – and yet it seems that this history has scarcely begun. Is it any wonder that at some point we become mistrustful, lose patience and, in our impatience, turn ourselves around, that we learn from this sphinx to ask questions for ourselves? Who is really asking us questions here? What is it in us that really wants the truth? In fact, we paused for a long time before the question about the origin of this will – until we finally remained completely and utterly immobile in front of an even more fundamental question. We asked about the value of this will. Suppose we want truth. Why should we not prefer untruth? And uncertainty? Even ignorance? The problem of the value of truth stepped up before us – or were we the ones who stepped up before the problem? Who among us here is Oedipus? Who is the Sphinx? It seems to be a tryst between questions and question marks. And could one believe that we are finally the ones to whom it seems as if the problem has never been posed up to now, as if we were the first ones to see it, to fix our eyes on it, and to dare confront it? For there is a risk involved in this – perhaps there is no greater risk."

(From Ian Johnston’s English translation of Beyond Good and Evil by Friedrich Nietzsche.)

Source: E-mail from Thorbjørn Gabrielsen, 10.11.2010

*Not yet translated into English. The title within parentheses is the Norwegian title's literal meaning.