In residence: Siebe Thijs
03.06.2025
Walking as breathing, as observing.
Walking as discovering, as saying goodbye.
Walking as transforming, as an individual, as a collective.
Four bodies wander through a landscape that is constantly shifting. They are always on the move, always looking for a place that is still strange to them. In their steps they lose themselves, merge with something unknown, and encounter again, in different guises, what they thought they had left behind.
In the music theatre performance Pilgrimage, composer Siebe Thijs brings a contemporary pilgrimage to the stage. A journey that vibrates on the border where the individual merges into the collective. The moment when the community rises above the individual.
The performance sways on the delicate border between the individual and the collective. It explores the tension between individuality and shared responsibility in an era that is increasingly turning inward. Pilgrimage invites us to reflect on the other, and to learn to understand walking again as an encounter. A rhythm of staying and leaving, of touching and letting go, all in one movement.
Together with Ferenc Balcaen (final director), Junior Akwety (performer), and a diverse artistic team, different forms of interaction and collectivity are explored. Starting from John Dowland’s song cycle A Pilgrimes Solace (1612), Thijs creates a new musical entity, which is performed live by four musical performers. They play musical instruments and objects, but also bodies and sculptures. They do this alone or as a collective, for themselves or for the other.
