Theatre: Robot boogie at Carlsberg

Start the new semester with a cultural boost, as robots dancers instead of beers debut on the Carlsberg brewery production line. The University Post reviews Steen Koerner’s new electric boogie performance ‘Human Robot’

by Nina Monrad Boel

Blue lights, people disguised as robots moving to electronic music, synchronised with a 3D video universe. Squares. Speed. Sound. System of co-ordinates. These are some of the first expressions you get, when you sit down in the old brewery hall to watch Steen Koerners new production Menneskerobot (Human robot, ed.).

You may know Carlsberg for their beers, and you might even be looking forward to starting your new semester in with a little help from the brand.

However, if you wander around their beautiful old factory grounds, you will find a lot more than just the amber nectar. A new dance theatre DANSEhallerne (The Dance Halls, ed.), which opened last summer is currently showing the performance Menneskerobot.

This is the place to start your serious cultural experience in Copenhagen without necessarily getting drunk.

Programmed unfaithfulness

»I keep within the box«, Lucy Love is rapping. The piece Menneskerobot is about city life with rules, uniformity, repetition. People are programmed to live their life in a specific way.

War is programmed. Love is programmed. Even unfaithfulness is programmed. Our lives programmed by schedules, clocks, predictions.

In Menneskerobot you live the difference between the minute and the moment. Emotions as fear and love are described through dance, lyrics and fantastic set design.

Steen Koerner makes you lose track of time and your sense of space.

An international crew

»We’re programmed, you know, to think within the parameters of what we’ve been born into, as opposed to what we truly feel and know deep within ourselves.«

The words are coming from Saul William’s deep and sensual voice. American writer, musician and actor, Saul Williams is known for his leading role in the movie Slam, and has now written the texts for the electronic music together with Danish grime rapper Lucy Love.

The choreographer, hip hop artist and master of electric boogie Steen Koerner is known in Denmark for The Nut Cracker among other dance pieces. Those of you who come from Japan might know him for The island in East, which played in Tokyo in 2005.

Among the dancers on stage are Robotdrengene, or The Robot Boys, whom Danes would know from DR (Danish national TV), and Pandora, from Los Angeles, one of the worlds best woman electric boogie dancers. And not forgetting the real dancing robot from Japan!

Menneskerobot plays at DANSEhallerne, the biggest centre for modern dance in northern Europe, at 8pm from the 13th of January to the 6th of February.

DANSEhallerne is located at:
Pasteusvej 20, Copenhagen V.
Bus 26 will take you there from the central station (get off at Kammasvej and walk about 500meters).

Students price for a ticket is 105kr and can be ordered from BilletNet, tel: 70 15 65 65.

Read more about Menneskerobot here

unis-avis@adm.ku.dk

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