Ana Čavić: A thread without end, Act I
visual storytelling performance
A thread without end, Act I is the first episode in Ana Čavić’s ever evolving and potentially never-ending visual performance storytelling cycle in which a mythopoetic creation story about two archetypal characters, a woman and an anthropomorphic fox, unravels like a thread without an end across four acts to date (Act I–IV). A thread without end is the story of their entangled fates, following their misadventures across primordial space and time in which the creation story is set.
The participatory performance Act I sees Čavić partially unfurling a five-metre-long paper scroll on a table and inviting the audience to assist her by ‘scrolling’ along while she simultaneously narrates and illustrates the unfolding story mapped out on the elaborately decorated scroll. A meandering text “thread” enables Čavić to take different story paths and, depending on the path taken, to illustrate the story in different ways, thus ensuring that the story is never performed in the same way twice. At the same time, Čavić encourages the audience to “feel” their way through the story by scrolling for, as they follow its literal and figurative twist and turns, they set the momentum of the storytelling performance alongside the performer.
A thread without end is a contemporary interpretation of cantastoria, a historical storytelling style in which a performer tells a story while pointing to a “visual aid” – a story map – that illustrates the narrative. Act I draws on Indonesian wayang bèbèr in which a storyteller similarly uses a scroll as a visual aid during the theatrical storytelling performance. Through “theatrical poeticization” (Paul Zumthor) Čavić conjures sumptuous visual scenes alongside her verse stories immersing audiences in her theatrical audio-visual storytelling performances.
Ana Čavić’s Papercut Poetry (Garden of Lost Things) series is on view at the EKO 9 group exhibition on the upper floor of the old sanatorium. The series offers mythopoetic re-interpretations of scenes from myths, folk tales, fairy tales, fables and legends.
The event will be held in English.
Ana Čavić is a visual artist, performer, poet and academic researching “performance storytelling”. Working across different media and fields, including art, literature and theatre, her interdisciplinary practice reflects a consistent engagement with storytelling, whether on the page or the stage. She creates works on paper, collages, papercuts, artist publications, digital poetry animations, interactive poem objects and theatrical storytelling performances. She has a PhD in Art, researching performance storytelling traditions and tracing an alternative history of publishing as performance.
