URUBUS

URUBUS, a book of short stories by the Berlin-based Brazilian writer Carla Bessa, is being reinterpreted performatively and musically on the stage of Acker Stadt Palast.

Urubus was the main winner of the 2020 Jabuti Prize (Brazil's highest literary award) and has now inspired the creation of the eponymous contemporary music and dance theater piece. In Portuguese, the title refers to vultures, and in the Brazilian context - Urubu - to a scavenging bird that feeds on waste and carrion.

The choreography of its circling flight, propelled by warm air currents, creates a hypnotic atmosphere that is brought to the stage through light, movement, and sound. The piece explores the sensations that this feared and unsettling bird evokes. What if the vulture and the vulture were to meet, and what do they tell us about humanity?
In Carla Bessa's collection of stories, the narratives interweave, each representing different aspects of a "Society of Vultures." Among them is the story "Vulkanen," which addresses the oppression of women in patriarchal society and will be almost unchanged in the current production.

The working structure chosen by the group for URUBUS is quite peculiar: Each artist or artist duo is entirely free in their creation and in choosing what they will use from the book as inspiration for their work - be it a story, a character, a situation, or a feeling. This results in the performance featuring both complete stories and impressions of stories, all under the guise of "Urubus."

The staging of URUBUS can be seen as a doppelganger of "urubus in visible." The latter was realized in December 2023 and is planned for further events in 2024. In the case of URUBUS, it is a doppelganger that extensively utilizes light and video.

By and with Aloísio Avaz, Daniel Brunet, Anete Colacioppo, Vinicius Giusti & mxm

Freely adapted from the text by Carla Bessa

A production by Acker Stadt Palast. Supported by the Senate Department for Culture and Social Cohesion.