Simon Mayer
SunBengSitting
SunBengSitting is a piece straddling yodelling, folk dance and contemporary dance, a trip to the past and a playful, humorous search for identity. Austrian farm boy and performance artist Simon Mayer tries to strap folk dance and traditional customs from ideological loads and outdated images of manliness. He points out the relationship between spirituality, folk music and folk dance and invites his audience to view seemingly outdated traditions with new eyes.
Having grown up on a farm facing traditions, nature, youthful rebellion and a bucolic heavy metal band, Simon Mayer moved to Vienna in 1997, attended Vienna’s State Opera’s dance school, spent a season as an aspiring dancer in the corps de ballet and very unexpectedly landed in a world where the word “farmer” could be used as an insult. The move was equal parts deliverance and constraint. SunBengSitting – “Sunbeng” is a word in the Upper Austrian dialect that means the bench in the sun in front of the farmhouse – deals with questions that emerge between the poles of city and country, homeland and foreign lands, pigeonholing and artistic freedom.
Simon Mayer works as a performance artist and musician and is also the artistic director of the Spiel art festival on the Schlossergütl organic farm in Upper Austria. He was previously in brut at last year’s imagetanz Festival with his piece Monkeymind and with a try-out of SunBengSitting at brutstätte in Zieglergasse. http://simon-mayer.tumblr.com
Performance, choreography, music Simon Mayer Sound, live loop, dramaturgical consultation Pascal Holper Light Lucas Gruber Production Sophie Schmeiser Artistic consultant Frans Poelstra Video Johannes Gierlinger, Jan Zischka Foyer installation Peter Mayer, Simon Mayer
Kindly supported by the Federal Province of Upper Austria, the Austrian Federal Chancellor’s Office and the Austrian Cultural Forum Brussels. Thanks to Kulturverein Spiel, Trachtenverein Altstädter Bauerngmoa, Goaßlschnalzer Munderfing, Pramtaler Volkstanzgruppe, the Mayer family, Christian Schmeiser, Josef Schild, Elio Gervasi/Raum 33, Im_Flieger, Shareyourdarlingsplattform, Trip the light fantastic, Buda Kortrijk, Sebastian Slupek and Rosas
Simon Mayer - SunBengSitting (Trailer) from brut Wien on Vimeo.