The Company
Multidisciplinary Live Art Creation
Theatre Junction is a live art ensemble, which, since its inception in 2006, has presented itself as a multilingual, and multidisciplinary collective. Led by its founder Mark Lawes, and Co-Artistic Director, Raphaele Thiriet, the company is comprised of actors, dancers, musicians, visual artists, all with unconventional and singular backgrounds. Together they create and explore themes that are at the intersection of their differences, constructing live performances that are composite forms of our time.
The research and writing of Mark Lawes and Raphaele Thiriet is derived from a system of collective creation in search of new artistic languages and forms of representation. This mode of creation is at the ‘junction’ of contemporary dance, theatre, film, music and visual art.
Theatre Junction recently received a New Chapter Grant for the Supernova Trilogy. The Trilogy is one of 200 exceptional projects funded through the Canada Council for the Arts to mark the 150th Anniversary of Confederation.
Creations
SUPERNOVA TRILOGY – CREATION 2018
“A genre-defying exploration of live and digital disturbances that ask, “if the medium is the message, what does it say?” The future becomes a retrospective in an absorbing probe in search for the possibility of ‘re-enchantment’ in a technological world.”
The last two years Theatre Junction has been working on the development of the he Supernova Trilogy, a multidisciplinary and multi-media work composed of three independent modules. Metaphorically, the trilogy follows the life cycle of a star. The explosive impact of new technologies on consciousness and the erosion of the utopian promise of the American Dream, combine to create a future that has yet to be constructed, in which science and imagination collide. Each module will consist of live performances and satellites, including short films, concerts, and installations.
The Supernova Trilogy had its world premiere in the frame of the Festival des Francophonies en Limousin in Limoges and was subsequently presented by the Festival International des Arts de Bordeaux in October 2018.
MODULE 1 – SUPERSATURATED
Module 1 of the Supernova Trilogy explores the acceleration of cultural change related to advances in technology. Instantaneous communication, social media, and high speed internet have altered consciousness and transformed our relationship to time, each other, and the world. Inspired by Douglas Coupland’s ‘supersaturated information age’, and underscored by a ready-made pop-art aesthetic, the company of artists surf the wave of a culture transformed by its own speed.
Module 2 – The End of a Dream
Module 2 of the Supernova Trilogy is situated after the high-speed crash of electronic interconnectedness and the implosion of the ‘global village’. What happens after the collapse of the American Dream? On the edge of a deserted landscape, fragments of a broken love story reawaken dreams of the past. There is a longing to go back home to the way things were, however that place is no longer what we thought it was, and we are no longer ourselves. Module 2 attempts an autopsy on the heartsick condition of a society that has lost its dreams.
MODULE 3 – THE LAST FALL OF WILE E COYOTE
In Module 3 of the Supernova Trilogy we watch the final fall of Wile E Coyote. This time, the famous coyote doesn’t get back up and repeat himself, instead he watches his image slowly dissolve under a starry sky. The last fall of Wile E Coyote is situated somewhere between the image and the shadow. Onstage a post-rock band sings songs as incantations to summon ancient memories or visions of the future, where animals resemble men. And on the screen, the performers are trapped and interrogated in a series of “assessments” inciting their fears and paranoia in a “post-truth” world where the camera is the only witness. And in the space between the stage and the screen, beyond the frame of the camera, there is an unknown territory, vast and infinitely complex, where nature and the cosmos carry on the subtle dance of reality. The performers act as a chorus in search of a collective reconfiguration of the present moment.
PRESS
“A mediation through dance, music, and in particular body language and movement that transcends the limitations of verbal language.” Brad Simm, Beatroute Magazine
“Supernova Trilogy invites the spectator as an object, subject, and actor of the research, to evaluate his own journey in life.” Natacha Margotteau, Mouvement Magazine
“A primal scream, animal, enraged, nostalgic and despaired. A call to awaken consciousness.”
Natalie Geilibert, Kulte
“The juxtaposition of the suburban and the solitude…is stunning and moving” Stephen Hunt, Calgary Herald
“Haunting, catastrophic, addicting — this performance covers all bases.”Lifestyle Magazine
“ I very much hope that this group of artists can continue their difficult while not commercial way of theatrical work in the future. I strongly believe that Theatre Junction will soon gain international reputation.”Almut Wagner
Contact
General Inquiries
CONTACT US
PRESENTATION INQUIRIES
MARK LAWESCo-Artistic Director
Email: mark@theatrejunction.com
RAPHAELE THIRIETCo-Artistic Director
Email: raphaele@theatrejunction.com
GENERAL INQUIRIES
Email: info@theatrejunction.com