/ɪnˈɛvɪtəb(ə)l/

her gift

her speech clear

her prophecy true

her destiny chosen by herself

giving away

her gift her curse

though incomprehensible

though unbelieved

to have no choice

The piece is movement toward something

you understand it is not to be reached

singing out for a thing

you understand is not to be heard

letting go knowing you will drown

Created and Performed by SEREN OROSZVARY and MIRKKU MATTINEN

cello | composition MIRKKU MATTINEN

concept | movement SEREN OROSZVARY

Text | Stimulus The Bell Jar and Ariel by SYLVIA PLATH, Agamemnon by AESCHYLUS (translated by G. Murray), Den Lille Havfrue ‘The Little Mermaid’ (1837) by HANS CHRISTIAN ANDERSON

Premiered on February 1st 2020 in ‘16 Solos’ at Von Krahl Teater, Tallinn Estonia

our research sat in the inversion of body as cello and cello as body, and the ways to navigate conversation between the two bodies, through improvisation, via the imaginary template of a music stave. The intention was to move away from dancer dancing to instrument, and instrument accompanying dancer, toward an alternative symbiosis. Creating a code language between musician and mover where the laws are set but the arrangement and nature of them is fluid, unpredictable.

Tension, dynamic, texture, speed. Through listening, the conversation begins in the moment where one performer becomes aware, comfortable with the impulse of the other and before it is able to be fully grasped the status is immediately shifted, but by whom exactly we cannot pinpoint in the time it happens. Each impulse simultaneously responds to and initiates the other. The movement forward happens by the continuous thwarting and renewal of physical and sonic dialogue between musician, cello and performer and body. It is working with physical conversation that is perceivable by not seeable, creating an interrelationship that can only exist and get its vitality from contradiction. Also working with the sensation of itch, and the action of itching through movement that is impossible to achieve or sustain - i.e. scratching nose with elbow, scratching scalp with air through repetitive force of the head through air. Stimulated by the story of Apollo and Cassandra. Apollo holds the reigns that curse Cassandra and yet Cassandra is ultimately the decider of her own destiny, by rejecting Apollo knowing that it comes with a cost. The two could be said to remain in dialogue, who is the true decider of Cassandra’s fate and inevitable fall. It is a conscious end, a doomed movement, but one that has to be moved. The movement forward in itself, the conversation on the way, needs to be enough.