by Oana Cristea Grigorescu
Simon Mayer (b.1984) is one of the most complex, acclaimed and non-conformist Austrian artists of the moment. Choreographer, musician, performer, curator and guest professor at numerous performing arts academies (in Austria, Belgium, France, Germany), laureate of important Austrian prizes, Simon Mayer casually transgresses the conventional boundaries of the arts. His shows are immersive and strongly socially engaged, structures that carefully employ movement, dance, music and narrative.
At FITS, Simon Mayer brings to the Romanian audience the performance Sons of Sissy, one of his most famous but also most controversial productions, which questions conservatism in society and culture. The show is presented as part of the festival with the support of the Austrian Cultural Forum in Bucharest.
Oana Cristea Grigorescu: You use traditional music and dances in your performances and draw inspiration from the local cultural heritage. What genre best describes your performances and how are they born?
Simon Mayer: Our shows belong to contemporary dance and performance, primarily because these two fields allow the greatest freedom of expression, but also because freedom of expression is one of the essential concerns of our work. We call on all the resources of the human body – voice, breath, movement as creative and artistic performative means – but we also reproduce the process by which all these are transformed.
I am very connected through my roots to the culture and popular art that inspires me in my work as a choreographer and musician, but also as a contemporary performer. Part of my inspiration comes from finding that in folk art, in general, there is no clear distinction between the dancer and the musician. Most dancers sing or play instruments, and most musicians are also fantastic dancers. It is a type of holistic approach, which we can find in all fields, if we think about it, in medicine, science, art, etc. As we know, it is possible that 1+1=3 after all. 🙂
Gender roles are being redefined in contemporary society. What commentary does Sons of Sissy advance on the traditional social order?
Simon Mayer: Popular culture and art have always integrated queer elements, which we aim to grant visibility to in our performances. In most rituals, costumes or dances there are undefined gender roles and elements that refer to a homosexual interpretation, without being explicitly named as such.
Therefore, our role is not to present the evils and shortcomings of the traditional social order and present contemporary society as a better version of the past, but rather to propose a perspective through which to showcase what traditional and contemporary societies have in common, to translate and capitalize on commonalities, differences and diversity. We do this simply in order to build bridges.
When in Sons of Sissy two naked men embrace lovingly on stage during a folk dance, we are not showing anything new. We’re just remembering and rediscovering that this kind of being with each other has always existed in folk culture, that mutual connection is possible and that it’s part of the traditional universe.
Also, through scenes where men dance with each other, in undefined gender roles, we want to show that in many areas, folklore is far from recognizing and freely living sexual fluidity and identity. Certainly, we are concerned with revealing how much fear and homophobia still exists in society, but also to say that it can be transformed through art and compassion.
What kind of artistic experiment are you undertaking in Sons of Sissy?
Simon Mayer: In our show we imagine a village where everyone is welcome and invited to participate in the creation of a universal folk dance that allows for a diversity of expressions and identities. The dance is performed in what we call “traditional human costume”, in other words, the dancers are completely naked. Before we get there, however, we imagine rituals of transformation, of liberation from the traumas of the past and of finding the resources of this transformation in folk art.
Our experiment wants to transform ignorance into knowledge by artistic means; to understand what happened in the past with the help of traditional dance and music. We must admit that, hidden deep within each of us, there is a little Hitler, in the sense that totalitarian regimes, still present in our bodies, claim and usurp folk art (music and rituals – in other words, the creative expression of the heart and of the artistic soul of a community and its individuals), with a violent finality. And the result is a misinterpretation of tradition and an unhealthy form of collective movement.
Our experiment consists in using the same forms, or similar forms (for example, dances), which some of us learned in childhood, in folk dance ensembles – those forms that have traveled down to us through all of history, some of which were even born during the horrible years of the war – and in playing with them, transforming them and hopefully freeing them from their past.
Thus, they will be able to serve their original purpose again, that of producing joy, of coagulating a healthy community through the healing power of celebration. Well, it seems that animated characters Pinky and Brain really are saving the world. But we’re still just the Sons of Sissy, those naked guys who play folk music and enjoy hugging each other.
The contemporary European world is characterized by two opposing trends: on the one hand, globalization is standardizing social norms and values, and on the other hand, the revival of nationalism represents a form of nostalgia for the old geographical, mental and social borders. What role do your performances play in crafting a contemporary artistic language?
Simon Mayer: In my art I try to explore a language that advocates for the diversity of expression and the human being, that speaks of the need for healthy boundaries – not to be confused with borders -, that gives birth to songs about “the meaning of an inner refuge” and about the importance of care towards our individual and collective way of ‘being, becoming and belonging’. And when the mind is troubled, it gently whispers to us: come, thoughts, help us feel!
My main concern, in fact, is to ask questions rather than pretend to have an answer. And some of the fundamental questions I’m asking myself right now are: How can we stay curious and nurture the inner space of that curiosity? Dear audience, what would you like to teach me? Mom, why are these men carrying guns? How can apathy be an intelligent function of my body?
Your movement performance proposes to the spectator to leave the strict framework of theater or dance. What kind of audience do your shows have in Austria?
Simon Mayer: My shows are aimed at the contemporary dance “bubble”, friends, family, young experimentalists and elderly people nostalgic for traditional music and dance. It is aimed at priests and their secret wives, the LGBTQ+ community, queer people, first and foremost gay men, homophobic traditionalists, people with folk dance trauma, those interested in a new perspective on home and traditions, women curious to see four naked men on stage, at numerous festival programmers and critics, but also at many other extraordinary people.
Cover image: Peter Empl
