Zuidpool

Zuidpool is a theatre collective with three key theatre-makers and players: Jorgen Cassier, Sofie Decleir and Koen van Kaam. Each one is an actor, director, musician, writer and adaptor. Their roles change with each production and are based not on an internal hierarchy, but on the nature of the project itself.

Zuidpool applies a kind of back-to-basics approach: the search for its own vision of what theatre can mean in our times.

Zuidpool also concentrates on probably the oldest premise in theatre: the mutual illusion of player and spectator. What connects the makers is their imagination. Zuidpool regards communication as a very intimate act, and therefore makes use of the huge range of non-actor-related theatrical props when absolutely necessary. External visual and audio props are there to enhance a pure theatrical feeling.

This stripped-down approach is not an end in itself, but a way of expressing something. The absence of tricks and effects makes the communication direct and unavoidable: neither player nor spectator can hide behind it. They take each other hostage, and are sentenced to one another.

The refusal to use an obvious repertoire opens up the search for moving and topical material. Existing plays and other writings are not necessarily put aside, but they are thoroughly examined. Their quality, the challenges they present and their relevance both to actors and audience are the most important criteria. In addition, material can be taken from all kinds of unusual sources, as in the case of Siberië, a theatrical concert based on songs, writings and the life of Vladimir Vissotsky. Or Oorlog, an adaptation of a Lars Norèn play. DUS was based on the eyewitness accounts of people who were involved in the Heizel Stadium drama and Nachtlied was a treatment of a play by Jon Fosse. Hooglied was based on a text from the Old Testament, whilst Cockfish was a theatrical adaptation of a documentary about Metallica. kReon, written by Jorgen Cassier, was a reinterpretation of the Thebes cycle in the tradition of Sophocles and Aeschylus. In season 2009 OPUSXX was a solitary performance about the accomplishments and the horrors of the 20th century. Macbeth was a succesful effort to create the original Globe sphere of this Shakespearean tragedy by performing an intriguing, mindblowing concertante version of the play.

 

 

 

Zuidpool works with material from a wide variety of eras, traditions and media. It examines material from the early 21st century to see what possibilities it throws up:

How can it excite both artist and audience and why?

What challenges are thrown up by its content and style?

In what ways does it mirror both our society and our theatrical tradition, our way of looking and listening?

How does it expose problem areas in the way we experience art?

What does it do with our view of the past, present and future worlds?

Zuidpool asks the public to fully participate in this questionary and be part of all the possible answers contemporary theatre may offer.