Failure as transformation. Tomáš Procházka returns with the durative performance LEMONADE: No Other Troy
Artist, dramaturge and performer Tomáš Procházka returns after a year with a new stage project LEMONADE: No Other Troy, which was created under the banner of the queer platform PiNKBUS. The premiere will take place on 19 November at Vítězná 15 in Prague's Smíchov district, with the first reprise a day later. However, this is not a regular performance - the performance is durational in nature and allows the audience to move freely through the space, entering and leaving during the afternoon until everything spills over into the performative part starting at 7:30 pm.
"I believe that the work will always say what it needs to - the one-year delay has benefited both it and me. I'm a different person than I was a year ago, twice as different as I was three years ago. That's the message of No Other Troy - we are evolving, we are always changing," says Tomáš Procházka.
The project, which loosely follows his earlier production The Evening, Moments Before I Committed Suicide (nominated for the Thalia Award), combines elements of documentary film, performance and drag art. In it, Walk turns the camera back on himself - as if he has become his own artistic material, which he explores, reshapes and reassembles. Here, failure becomes not an end, but the germ of a new creation.
The title LEMONADE refers to transformation - to the symbolic gesture of transforming the acidity of life into something that can be swallowed, perhaps even savored. The walk on stage changes, ages, fails, tries again, giving the audience the opportunity to observe the process, not the result. "Tonight I'd like to try something. I may not succeed - but that's okay. Because I can try again," he says in one line.
The project was made with the financial support of the Ministry of Culture of the Czech Republic and the residency programmes of the Pôtoň Theatre and the Truhlárna space. The preparations also included the Cleaning the House training conducted by the Marina Abramović Institute.
This year, the PiNKBUS platform, which is behind the production, is giving space to its own members to present their own projects. After the successful guest appearance of Helena Araújo, it is Procházka who comes up with a new experiment that pushes the boundaries of long-form performance and at the same time builds on his personal artistic development.
The set design is by Ľudmila Bubánová, the costumes are by Vojtěch Hanyš and Procházka himself, the video recording is by Michal Ďuriš and the photography is by Josef Rabara.
LEMONADE: No Other Troy is a work about mistakes that become the basis for growth, about the courage to start anew, illuminated by self-irony - and about queer art that seeks strength and catharsis in intimacy and vulnerability.
Opening night will be November 19 from 5:00 to 8:30 pm at the Vítězná 15 space, with the first performance on November 20 at the same time. Audience members may enter at 5:00, 6:00 or 7:00 pm, with the last entry just before the performance portion begins at 7:00 pm.
