SAT 19 APR / 17h00 + 21h30
Centro Cultural de Lagos
Performance / M12 / 40'
Free Admittance
ARK 1 explores the precarious futures of human culture amid the life-altering interventions of artificial intelligence and ecological crisis. It proposes an archaeology of the future that questions: how will the history of humanity be archived, remembered, and technologically retrieved in the aftermath of coming catastrophes?
Set in the future, a fictitious bio-technology corporation VESSELS INC created the spaceship ARK 1 to preserve the distant memory of human life. As Earth’s resource depletion and degraded ecosystems threatened human extinction, VESSELS INC launched ARK 1 into deep space equipped with the technology for sustaining artificial life. Onboard, an algorithm digitally reconstructed the dancer Leah Marojevic to preserve the muscle memory of human experience. After aeons had passed, ARK 1 was finally detected by an intelligent life form that salvaged an assemblage of deteriorating data from the ancient ship. With no knowledge of life on Earth, they created a cosmic archeological record of Earth’s post-human remains.
Text: Carlos Kong
Artistic Direction and Choreography: Colette Sadler
Performance: Leah Marojevic
Video & Installation Design: Mikko Gaestel
Live voice manipulation / Sound: Heiko Tubbesing
Sound: Samir Kennedy
3D Animation: Alexander Pannier
Dramatury: Alan McKendrick
Costume: Eyal Meistel & Zoe Sebanyiga
ARK 1 is funded by Nationale Performance Netz Stepping Out Fund and Creative Scotland. Coproduction Sophiensaele and Tanz Im August 2021. Presented as an exhibition in the context of Goethe Morph* Iceland, with the support of the Goethe-Institut and Nordic House Reykjavik. Residency support from Tanz Haus NRW, Fabrik Potsdam and TWR Glasgow.
Colette Sadler is a dancer, choreographer, and multi-disciplinary artist. She has worked internationally as a dancer with renowned choreographers such as Wayne McGregor, Amanda Miller (Pretty Ugly), and Lanonima Imperial Barcelona. Since 2007, Sadler’s choreographic work has been presented in various international dance and visual arts contexts, including Tanz Im August Berlin, Performatik Festival Kaai Theatre Brussels, Art Night London, and Tokyo Festival Japan.
Her work intersects dance, sculpture, and digital art, often exploring the relationship between the human and non-human, as well as real and virtual spaces. Sadler stages bodies and identities in moments of transformation, creating transitions between these realms through fiction. Since 2016, she has been developing Present Futures, a curatorial project examining speculative futures and post-humanism, in collaboration with the Centre of Contemporary Art Glasgow, UK.
