Labyrinth Of The Other

Overview

Labyrinth Of The Other (LOTO) is loosely based on my lived experience and is an interdisciplinary reimagining of the classically greco-anglo, patriarchal, myth of the Minotaur. LOTO looks at the origins of the Minotaur, the sins of the father, the mother maligned, the architect nearly lost in his design, the monster, and the sister left behind to die. LOTO asks who we are beneath the mask of the monster? Who even gets to define what the word monster means? LOTO is a ritual container for personal and collective healing. It is a homecoming. It is a shedding of skin. It is a transformation, a call to go beyond the threshold of erasure, to rest, to learn and remember. To listen, to change, to rearrange, to move forward and create with intention.

LOTO engages emotions, intellect, and psyche through a layer cake of language. The languages of sound, symbolism, movement, and story. –In this immersive installation the audience serves as a second character, a scene partner and force all its own in conversation with our narrator. Severin invites the audience to witness and traverse the space. Audience members may choose to shape their journey from a list of seven intentions: spirituality, inwardness, creativity, simplicity, integration, intimacy, vibrancy. There are elemental undertones of water, fire, earth, mineral, nature, and silence allowing for a break from the rushing electric background hum of the world and giving space to hear one’s inner voice. Together these weave a story to engage comfort, fear, compulsion, release, tenderness, gentleness, and flying in the face of uncertainty.

About the Artist

Severin Blake (he/they/we) is an transdisciplinary artist, facilitator, and writer. The work they create interrogates language, imagery, and linear time. They facilitate intentional spaces of bravery, vulnerability, and joy making with the Network of Ensemble Theaters (NET) and Culture Change Lab (CCL). Their workbook Deprogramming Alienation can be found on their website. As a performer Severin has over 20 years of experience and has appeared on stage at InterAct, Orbiter 3, Simpatico, PolyGlamourous, Philadelphia Artists Collective, Philadelphia Asian Performing Artists, CCTC, Theatre Exile, StageWest, Peoples Productions, Yael Bartana, and Almas Engine and in exhibition at the PMA. Theyve created original roles in collaboration with Headlong Dance Theater (incubated artist), Annie Wilson, Swim Pony, The Painted Bride, The Private Theater, Black Best Friend and Applied Mechanics (Company Member).

Credits