Pounding in the shadows

Both authors of the performance are employees in the creative workplace within the cultural sector. The performance portrays their position in life, that is, the position of an individual torn between his job and artistic creation, and the feelings of absurdity, imprisonment, helplessness and inner tension that arise from the antagonisms of this position. As a worker/employee, a person is caught in the cogs of the social system that he intentionally or unintentionally cocreates, recreates and maintains as an invisible and underpaid robot/machine. As a creator/freelance artist, on the other hand, he is an individualist who remains outside the system. This position allows him to see it differently than it is "prescribed" to him, to take a critical distance towards it and hence become a piece of litter/a wedge in its cogs, which he slows down, eventually perhaps even stops, and turns in a different direction. The paradox of this position is reflected in the concept of the performance, which is the result of the free artistic activity of the two authors, while it at the same time also stages their involvement in the cogs of the system. The stage set represents the social system as a whole, which is divided into the consumer and production sectors. The system is driven by the worker with his power and energy, like a robot/machine that is itself invisible and insignificant, only the effects of whose work are noticeable. The music, with its methodical concept in programming and manipulation, reflects the modern technology of the higher work processes and, with its energetic and dark expression, the noise of industrial production.