HABITUATION

We asked ourselves how the way we relate to climate change will shift as its effects become impossible to ignore. We asked ourselves what we imagine the future will look like, from a present marked by insufficient action. At the start of the show we learn that something is about to end, but we don't know what, when, or how it will be - all we can do is wait, and the emptiness of waiting can only be filled by telling stories.

In one of the first discussions with the extended team, the term "palliative care" came up, which later became something like the engine of my approach. So I tried to find the warmth within this planetary situation: the warmth in our despair, the warmth in our lack of action, the warmth in our denial, the warmth in our outrage, the warmth in our cynicism, etc. etc. etc. (Ioana Hogman, writer)

Working on this show was, for me, an allegory of a personal emotional process. A process that's quite hard to sum up in words, which starts out from fear and helplessness and fumbles through the dark for something that feels like a kind of home, searching for a safe place to wait for… something. A lament. People too small, wandering, too little time. A handshake so strong it breaks your bones, but that you don't want to let go of. (Irina Ionescu, video artistx, set designerx)

Six performers are waiting for something. They don't know when it's coming, but they're sure it is. They keep checking the clock, they become absurd and ridiculous, they tell stories. We don't quite understand what's happening, who's telling the story, but at some point they repeat, for exactly 5 minutes, the same word. THAT word. It seems like things are starting to make sense. We overlay planes, we let randomness coexist with rigid structure. In the tension between these extremes, when we truly see, hope can be born. (Raul Coldea, director)