Ekspeditsioon production turns everyday objects into instruments

Estonian theater company Ekspeditsioon has premiered “Mis olnud on kirjas mu lihas” (“What Has Been Is Written in My Flesh”) at the studio of the Krulli Maja theater, using the sounds of an ordinary apartment building as its central subject, ERR reports.

Audience members enter the theater through a wardrobe and sit as if in someone’s living room, observing the daily life of an ordinary resident. Although a person is on stage, the main character is the apartment itself and the sounds produced inside it.

“Everything is very everyday. All the objects are recognisable, and you could find a similar interior when visiting someone. These ordinary things that happen, such as running out of bread, a blocked toilet or a burned-out light bulb, are all part of the ebb and flow of life,” performance artist Urmas Lüüs said.

The production has three creators, Marika Vaarik, Lauri Lest and Lüüs, who all appear on stage. Vaarik said the collaboration was an experiment in combining the perspectives of two installation artists with that of an actor.

Soundscapes play a central role in the room-based production. Lest turns household objects, including a washing machine, electric stove, cupboards, shelves and a clothes-drying rack, into sources of sound and music.

The work can be viewed as a theater performance, a spatial installation, a collage of soundscapes or an anthropological observation. The creators have avoided assigning it a fixed genre, Lüüs said, because any label could impose a predetermined framework on the work.