ARK 1

A video installation and dance performance by Colette Sadler with Mikko Gaestel.

ARK 1 explores the precarious futures of human culture amid the life-altering interventions of artificial intelligence and ecological crisis and proposes an archaeology of the future that questions: how will the history of humanity be archived, remembered, and technologically retrieved in the aftermath of coming catastrophes?

Set in the future, a fictitious bio-technology corporation VESSELS INC created the spaceship “ARK 1” to preserve the distant memory of human life. As Earth’s resource depletion and degraded ecosystems threatened human extinction, VESSELS INC launched ARK 1 into deep space equipped with the technology for sustaining artificial life. Onboard, an algorithm digitally reconstructed the dancer Leah Marojevic to preserve the muscle memory of human experience.

After aeons had passed, ARK 1 was finally detected by an intelligent life form that salvaged an assemblage of deteriorating data from the ancient ship. With no knowledge of life on Earth, they created a cosmic archeological record of Earth’s post-human remains.

Text: Carlos Kong

CREDITS

Choreography, Text & Video: Colette Sadler
Original Concept: Colette Sadler & Mikko Gaestel
Performance: Leah Marojevic
Video & Installation Design: Mikko Gaestel
Sound: Samir Kennedy, Heiko Tubbesing & Colin Self
3D Animation: Alexander Pannier
Dramatury: Alan McKendrick
Costume: Eyal Meistel & Zoe Sebanyiga

ARK 1 is funded by Nationale Performance Netz “Stepping Out” Fund and Creative Scotland and presented in the context of Goethe Morph* Iceland, with the support of the Goethe-Institut and Nordic House Reykjavik. Residency support from Tanz Haus NRW, Fabrik Potsdam and TWR Glasgow.

PREMIERE: Tanz im August
13-16 August 2021
Elisabethkirche Berlin-Mitte
www.tanzimaugust.de

OTHER PERFORMANCES:
Tanzhaus NRW, Düsseldorf
14–15 January 2022

Nordic House, Reykjavik
10–13 October 2022

Alongside the original performance and video Installation ARK 1, this exhibition commissioned for Goethe Morph Iceland contains visual arts works made by Colette Sadler in collaboration with Mikko Gaestel and Valentin Hertweck.