Eyolf Machine

Eyolf Machine is a theatre project written and directed by Elias Adam. Based on Ibsen’s Little Eyolf, the story follows a young boy who has been subjected to a life of emotional and physical abuse by his parents until one day he decides to get on stage and share the brutal truth with the world. 

 

Through the director’s psychoanalytical, often surreal and brutal narration the personal fuses with the political. Using a combination of theatre, performance and dance, the performers continuously switch between Eyolf’s story, general sociopolitical commentary and an inner exploration of their own traumas and histories. 

 

One of the main themes that emerges from this play is the deconstruction and the laying bare of domestic violence and the denial that enables and reproduces it. This micro-world familial juxtaposition between what seems to be and what is, becomes apparent at the macro-scales of national and international politics and social affairs. 

 

On the whole, the play investigates the special role of contemporary performance in questioning power mechanisms within family, post-colonial societies and the art scene itself. The art discourse is most present, as Eyolf questions the classical dramatic theatre structures by proclaiming that we need no plots anymore.