Visit the exhibition on 21 & 22 September 2024 / 14.00 – 18.00
Performance on 22 September at 16.00
Join us on 21 and 22 September 2024 for Flax, baby! Flax! [variations] by Marie Ilse Bourlanges and Liza Prins, presented at Zone2Source, het Glazen Huis.
The presentation revolves around Flax, baby! Flax!, an operatic performance that unites historical and contemporary labor, its struggles and rhythms, and the mobilizing force of –protest– songs. This performance brings forth the labor-intensive process of transforming flax into linen fibers while exploring themes of labor struggles, capitalist industrialization, political agency, and love across time.
On 22 September at 16.00, twelve performers—dancers and singers—will bring the work to life, using flax harvest and sculptural reinterpretations of pre-industrial flax tools, as they sing about interconnected struggles, aiming to foster cross-historical solidarity.
Opera-performance directed by Marie Ilse Bourlanges and Liza Prins
Libretto written by Liza Prins and Marie Ilse Bourlanges
Musical compositions by Bergur Anderson and Liza Prins
Scenography and choreography by Marie Ilse Bourlanges and Liza Prins
(Clog dance co-developed with Berenike Melchior)
Performed by: Bergur Anderson, Joana Guiné, Logan Hon Mua, Robin Becker, Romy Day Winkel, Giulia Damiani, Bitna Youn, Miriam van Rijsingen, Pilar Mata Dupont, Berenike Melchior, Liza Prins, and Marie Ilse Bourlanges.
The performance lasts approximately 30 minutes. Seating will be available, and the space is wheelchair accessible.
This project is the result of three years of research by Prins and Bourlanges into historical work-song repertoires and pre-industrial linen production, focusing on both the material (cultivation and tools) and immaterial (songs and dances) aspects. During this time, they maintained their own flaxfield at the edge of Flevopark in Amsterdam, harvesting three seasons of flax. The musical compositions for Flax, baby! Flax! were developed together with sound artist Bergur Anderson. The songs incorporate fragments of lyrics from a series of workshops hosted at A Tale of a Tub, that informed Prins & Bourlanges’ writing of the libretto.
Throughout the summer, Bourlanges and Prins were residents at Zone2Source’s Park Studio (Orangerie), where they hosted open rehearsals – Flax, baby! Flax! [preludes] – in preparation of the performance, and produced sculptural flax tools using labor-intensive wood carving techniques. During the residency, they also created a second volume of Field Recordings, a series of mixtapes synthesizing archival sound research into the political dimension of singing practices; KHOREIA, a video work centered on grain threshing and feminized excess, filmed and edited by Yana Khazanovich; and Three Years of Plotting under the Exeter Elm, a video documenting the maintenance of their flax plot at Flevopark, edited by Mathilde Renault. These works will be presented at Zone2Source during Flax, baby! Flax! [variations].
het Glazen Huis
