In Machine (Mašina), Bojana Robinson develops a singular artistic language that is equally personal, political and poetic. A duet between herself and a breathing machine used to alleviate the health condition of her daughter, the piece develops an ascetic, anti-confessional and stoic choreography based on three movement research principles.
First: a durational, repetitive, flat (bio)mechanical reproduction of movements of the functioning of the machine becomes the engine for choreography. Second: an exploration of how the weight of the machine changes Robinson’s body shape and ability to produce movement. Third: an exploration of imagery in which her body becomes similar in shape, colour and form to the machine, and where the two merge into a new post-human entity. These three techniques (choreographic, physical and visual) move the centre away from the human, while addressing the fragility and (dys)function of bodies within the great capitalist machine that discards those who cannot be exploited. The question of precarious working conditions in the arts is also directly addressed in the opening, when Bojana presents herself through her work as an artist and mother and through the story about ‘a woman who wanted to rest’.
These movement materials are framed by two texts: a poetic narrative about a woman’s mysterious dislocation to a desert in Chile where she falls asleep between the remains of humans and machines, dreaming of water coming; and a video in which an engineer names the machine’s internal parts as human organs – brain, heart, and so on, – finishing with ‘that’s it’ and grounding the ending of the show back in material reality. A third text in the middle of the piece, an audio recording of the first monologue of Medea in Slovenian (Robinson is Serbian but lives and works in Ljubljana) opens yet another reference in the rich net of meanings that this show unfolds through austere means – the machine is both the child and the mother, and the performer is the mother that becomes the machine.
The sound of the working machine contributes to the minimal soundscape of the piece and affirms that the machine is working on stage as much as the performer is, and the two support each other as equal partners.
