MOLTA
Roots, rot, riot
MOLTA is an immersive interdisciplinary installation and a live performance. The artist Rósa Ómarsdóttir creates ecosystems which are transformed through natural processes. This ecosystem melts, leak, decomposes, grow, morphs and evaporates. Molta means compost in Icelandic and is a metaphor. Compost is a place for both decomposition and fertility, where obsolete and outmoded phenomena break down and new ones spring up. In the work MOLTA Rósa explores tentative and ever changing ecosystems. She explores the boundaries of man, environment and technology, where everything affects each other. Humans morph together with mushrooms, plastic particles and electrons. What springs out of the compost?
During the opening hours of the museum, visitors can freely walk around the installation, dwell in it and interact with it.
After closing, on advertised evening, a live performance takes place for the duration of four hours. The piece is a collaboration with the Icelandic Dance Group. In the performance Rósa explores the relationship between dance, choreography, music, art, body and materials, audience and performers.
The audience is invited to a picnic inside the installation. An encounter between the performers and the audience takes place, where the performers appear as sculptures, creatures, animals, nature or forces and are part of the ecosystem. The audience is offered a place and time to experience ever-changing environment, roots, rot and riot. The work explores an experience of transformation and time. Sometimes the changes are so slow that they are barely noticeable, while other times they are so fast that they are barely missed. The audience is invited to dwell, watch, listen, be, hang out, eat, drink and rest while the performers and the environment transform. Look more, listen, sense, take a break and come back to a new space that after a little over four hours has possibly become a part of themselves.
Food and drinks will be served during the performance, produced by chef Kjartani Óla Guðmundsson, where ecosystems, the environment and the performers themselves are part of what is on offer.
MOLTA was created in close collaboration with the entire artistic team.
Artistic team:
Artistic direction and choreography: Rósa Ómarsdóttir.
Performers: Saga Sigurðardóttir, Karítas Lotta Tuliníus, Erna Gunnarsdóttir, Andrean Sigurgeirsson and Gabriele Bagdonaite.
Music: Nicolai Johansen.
Dramaturg: Ásrún Magnúsdóttir.
Costumes: Kristjana Reynisdóttir.
Installation team: Rósa Ómarsdóttir, Guðný Hrund Sigurðardóttir, Hákon Pálsson and Valdimar Jóhannsson.
Artistic advice for installation: Guðný Hrund Sigurðardóttir.
Light: Hákon Pálsson.
Technical manager: Valdimar Jóhannsson.
Interns: Olivia Pyszko and Júlía Kolbrún Sigurðardóttir.
The project is funded by the Performing Arts Fund, the City of Reykjavík, Nordisk Kulturfond, Landsbankinn and Kópavogur Arts and Culture fund.
Co-producers: Íslenski Dansflokkurinn, Reykjavík Dance Festival, Dansehallerne Copenhagen, C-takt Belgium.
Residency support: Dansverkstæðið and WpZimmer Belgium.
Rósa Ómarsdóttir bio
Rósa Ómarsdóttir is an interdisciplinary choreographer. In her work, Rósa explores the relationship between humans and nature, in search of non-anthropocentric narratives. She strives to create a rich ecosystem of humans, non-humans and invisible forces. Her work is interdisciplinary in nature, interweaving choreography, live soundscapes and visual art, with a feminist approach to dramaturgy that embraces vulnerability and flux.
Rósa’s work has been shown at numerous festivals, theatres, galleries and art museums across Europe. Amongst those are LOFFT Theater Leipzig, Museum Dhont’ Dhaenes in Ghent, Beursschouwburg Brussels, the Flemish Parliament, Homo Novus Festival Latvia, MIR Festival Athens and MDT Stockholm. Rósa has also received a six-month residency at the Akademie Schloss Solitude in Stuttgart and at the Chaillot Theater National de la Danse in Paris, as well as many shorter residencies around the world. Her work has received numerous nominations for Grímunn and has been awarded for soundscape of the year and as choreographer of the year.
Photo credit: Hákon Pálsson
Model: Karítas Lotta Tuliníus