SZENE
Salzburg

Extinction Room (Hopeless.) is a performative, multi-channel sound installation comprised of recordings of extinct and endangered species of birds. Throughout a soundscape of bird calls, cries and songs, developed in collaboration with composer AGF (aka Antye Greie), three performers recount the stories of these species. Scientific narratives of extinction interweave with myths. Folk songs and dances are brought to life. The emotional load – the sorrow – is intensified by the performers who lead the audience through these traumatic experiences of loss, and of losses yet to come.

SERGIU MATIS
is a Romanian choreographer born in 1981 in Cluj-Napoca. He received his dance education at the Liceul de Coregrafie in Cluj and the Mannheim Academy of Dance, and began his career at Tanztheater Nuremberg. He has been living and working in Berlin since 2008, creating his own works such as Keep It Real (2013), Explicit Content (2015), Neverendings (2017), Hopeless. (2019) and UNREST (2021).

Concept and choreography: Sergiu Matis
Choreographic collaboration: Martin Hansen, Manon Parent
Performance: Martin Hansen, Sergiu Matis, Manon Parent
Sound installation and composition: AGF aka Antye Greie
Text: Philip Ingman, Sergiu Matis, Mila Pavićević
Species research: Philip Ingman
Dramaturgy: Mila Pavićević
Sound: Ivan Bartsch
Production management: 4Culture Association
Distribution: Danila–Freitag, Agentur für Performative Künste

Co-produced by: 4Culture Association and WASP Studios.
Supported by DIEHL+RITTER/TANZPAKT RECONNECT (funded by the German Federal Government Commissioner for Culture and the Media as part of the NEUSTART KULTUR initiative), apap – FEMINIST FUTURES (co-funded by the Creative Europe programme of the European Union) and ICI-CCN Montpellier – Occitanie (part of Life Long Burning (LLB) – Towards a Sustainable Eco-System for Contemporary Dance in Europe, supported by the Creative Europe programme of the European Union).
Animal recordings are courtesy of the Macaulay Library at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology and the Xeno-canto Foundation.

• www.sergiumatis.com