We
hide our timid heart under a hard exterior and listen to the radio
while our neighbour slays his cat.
We only believe
in what we can see, but too often we see only the bizarre things
which thrill or frighten us.
Life is complicated.
Fortune leads us into blind situations, but our confidence remains
unshaken.
Sometimes we
keep our composure and behave in a civilised manner, and at other
times we race through life with flying limbs.
Everything moves
at full speed.
We feel a great
yearning for life and yet we sometimes stop and do nothing. Later
we regret the time wasted, since death approaches rapidly and inexorably.
But we remain
calm and optimistic.
Everything that
we do turns into a surrealistic but satisfying futility.
And when the
lover's face become a death mask, we say - what does it matter?
- soon we all will be buried in the earth or lie as ashes in a casket.
And when horror takes us by the throat - what do we do? We try to
dance it away. And if that does not work, { we go out and eat
a hamburger - that always helps.
The abyss opens
at our feet. At waist level Paradise begins and our heads are in
the clouds.
Press Reviews
"...2 women and 3 men sometimes
do everything to make existence more difficult and at other times
set out to make it easier. This complication one takes for granted....Trivial
actions are amusingly depicted and develop apparently by accident
into art and in the same sly manner produce moments of happiness....The
scenes give the effect of having been miraculously created out of
the moment. Little gestures mean a lot; a hand that slowly wanders
a bit closer to the person opposite, a leg moving an inch away.
One is not so sure - could this have been happiness? The courage
to reduce actions to the minimum pays off...The production thrives
very DRIFT-like from the strong personalities of the actors. All
five persons are independent, wondrously formed characters who still,
as a group, convey homogeneity....With their unconventional ideas
and eccentric images they succeed in creating genuine surprises
- in itself a touch of happiness!"
Tages-Anzeiger,
Zurich, 15th January 2001
"..the ingeniously witty, absurdly bright choreography "La
vie heureuse" is a highlight of the Oldenburg Ballet Festival....a
humorous event with an inclination to the absurd and a tendency
to defy description....Every movement, even the crossing of the
legs or a slide around on the floor develops into a dance expression
- stylised, without becoming tiresome, precise, without being formal
...
Nordwest-Zeitung,
Oldenburg, 17th March 2001
"...Happiness is perfidious. When it appears, it can also reveal
abysses and disaster. The DRIFT Company with their wonderful mixture
of surrealistic meditation, flippant poetry, witty absurdity, theatre
and dance display happiness. The characters presented by DRIFT are
pleased and annoyed about the most unexpected matters. But they
are also so receptive that happiness can easily reach their hearts
.....but just as easily elude them. The secret of the art of DRIFT
is their enchanting fantasy combined with a incredible precision
of movement. The basis of success of the group - for years one of
the leading assets of the dance scene in Switzerland - is the abstraction,
compression and deconstruction of actions and interactions to the
extent that little gestures can tell long stories.....The language
of movement of the DRIFT Company is unusual and different from that
of other dance groups. Movements are enlarged as if they were viewed
under a magnifying glass and extended into the fantastic and unexplainable.
Neue
Luzerner Nachrichten, 17th January 2001
".....how to chew off one's ear while dancing..."la vie
heureuse" - is an irritating and at the same time delightful
charming story about the pursuit of happiness For their entrancing
and touching piece the dance quintet received well merited applause
lasting several minutes. .."
Badische
Neueste Nachrichten, Karlsruhe, 23rd march 2001
"...Everything combines harmoniously. The characteristic music
matches the individual vocabulary of movement which, in turn, is
co-ordinated with unusual stage settings...the lightness of their
irony also provokes happiness in the spectator..."
Die Rheinpflanz,
Ludwigshafen, 26th March 2001
"....Swirling and sprightly the DRIFT Company dances the language
of happiness for one hour.....The burden of the fruitless pursuit
is portrayed with entertaining lightness and the precision of dancing."
Aargauer
Zeitung, 15th January 2001
"....with their condensed and precise dance in which something
like bliss becomes apparent, they continue to convey happiness to
their audience. Their choreography is built on movements that on
first glance appear to be totally normal as well as perfectly incidental.
{ they start to play and to work miracles. They vary their material,
built up to grotesque exaggerations or merely standby or they may
concentrate and compress it to minimal movement with every detail
clearly differentiated....."
Der Landbote,
Zurich 16th January 2001
