Since overcoming the financial crisis, Iceland has been present in all discussions and debates about political ways of crisis management. At the same time, Iceland seems to meet the expectations of European dreams in terms of social politics and civic care, having a sustainable economy with a fair social constitution and equal distribution of goods. Is it really so or would we just like it to be so?

“Usland” invites to an installation of constantly shifting (somewhere between the speed of a glacier and a stock market), where objects evoke an unexpected shared space between the clichés of commerce, commodity, and artifice. These are the topologies of isolation, experimentation and of the community. Where’s the body supposed to fit? And where’s contemporary art? Let video and sound be your guide.

The performance “Usland” is an attempt to conduct an experiment asking what is imaginable in our positions and within our societies. Could we imagine living in a country without an army or military sector? Would we be able to develop a system of direct democracy? Could we accept a country ruled by artists? What would happen if we treated the cultural sector as the country’s most important foundation? Where do our dreams of society come from? And where do they lead?

Producer
Ksenia Duńska

Co-production between Goethe-Institut and the Centre for Culture in Lublin (Theatre Confrontations Festival) on the occasion of the “Tauschen und Teilen” Culture Symposium in Weimar, 2016. The project was developed within the framework of the “Sąsiedzi” (“Neighbours”) residential programme, run by the Theatre Confrontations Festival.

Special thanks to
Georg Blochmann