Medea Material

Woman, mother, goddess, witch, lover, murderess, but also migrant, foreigner, barbarian, slave, refugee fleeing her own land, betrayed by the man to whom she gave absolute loyalty and deprived by him of all rights. To choose to work on the materials Heiner Müller composed for the figure of Medea, means to face a myth of ancient origins: feminist, antipatriarchal, decolonial; still extremly powerful and eloquent in our present.
Composed at different times between 1949 and 1982, Müller’s Medea unfolds in three parts:
– Despoiled Shore, based in Strausberg, where the last tank battle of World War II took place, headquarters of the DDR, “can be shown during the simultaneous operation of a peepshow”;
– Medea Material, “shorthand of a last-stage honorable dispute” based on Seneca, Euripide, Hans Henny Jahnn;
– Landscape with Argonauts, inspired by Wasteland and Ezra Pound, “presupposes the catastrophes, on which humanity is working”.
In a 1983 interview, the author states that today “the voyeur has the opportunity to pay for a good seat from which to observe as many catastrophes as possible without being disturbed”. These words are key to understanding the performance’s space and its relationship with the audience’s gaze, especially in the third part of the work, where the spectators become jointly responsible for the catastrophes we live in and await, thanks to a reversal of perspective.With this work Agata Tomšič continues her path of vocal-sound research, manipulating an extremely difficult, living, searing, radical textual material by connecting it with a refined audio-light composition. To do this she relies on the collaboration with Matevž Kolenc, composer, arranger and music producer, nominated for the 2024 Ubu Prizes along with the Slovenian cult band Laibach for the sound project of Saint Joan of the Stockyards.
Black-dark-assolute and yellow-gold-sun, are the protagonists of a visual device where light is dosed with the very smallest amounts to leave the preponderant role to the sound dimension. A dark and implicit homage to the mosaic works of Ravenna, the source of inspiration for Klimt’s fatal women and Burri’s tactile paintings, contemporary icons where the sacred and the profane meet, as in the origins of Empress Theodora, like Medea coming from the regions bordering the Black Sea.

text Heiner Müller
translation by Saverio Vertone
courtesy of Agenzia Danesi Tolnay
concept, direction, space Agata Tomšič / ErosAntEros
music and sound design Matevž Kolenc
with Agata Tomšič
costumes bàste sartoria
movement assistant Francesca Frani Dibiase
technical direction and set-up Vincenzo Scorza
scientific consultants Benedetta Bronzini, Anja Quickert, Daniela Sacco

production ErosAntEros
in residency at Artificerie Almagià POLIS Teatro Festival, Teatro di Dioniso Officina Anacoleti #ogniluogoèunteatro
with the support of Internationale Heiner Müller Gesellschaft
with the patronage of Goethe-Institut Mailand

with the support of ATER Fondazione
in collaboration with Istituto Italiano di Cultura a Sofia