「壁」と戯れる / Mauerspiel

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Natsuko Tezuka’s dance performances are based on body observations, which she was already practicing in Japan. Throughout the last few years, she has also been developing pieces that gaze at interpersonal relationships as well as at the underlying society. She migrated to Germany two years ago. By living in a world in which language and culture are vastly different, she began compiling new observations: She realised that Japanese also exists from a wholly different viewpoint. This difference in perspective influences her understanding for situations and emotions.

The performance “Mauerspiel” (“Wall Game”) broaches the issue of those observations. Which walls does one hit if living in an environment with a completely different language and culture? How do Tezuka’s Japanese language and culture affect somebody who grew up in Germany? Tezuka and her German foil confront this linguistic and cultural wall, they play with it, trying to communicate with each other. But what does communication even mean in today’s times that are marked by constant change and social media? And what effect do restrictions, the grown interpersonal distance, have on us in a post-coronavirus era? Observing this, they play with this “wall of communication”, as one is tortured yet by its imperviousness. What kind of medium can our body become? Which possibilities do we have at our disposal?