Theater Mitu's piece Remnant is an affecting and surprising reflection on loss. This new work is noteworthy both for its engagement of Theater Mitu's interdisciplinary practice and for its delicate and empathic look at difficult and painful experiences.
Remnant is an interdisciplinary performance and visual art installation created after three years of gathering hours of interviews with a range of communities worldwide touching upon the topics of death, loss, and war, each interview becoming a remnant. These remnants have been sewn together to create a three part cycle, a three-act play with no beginning or ending, with sound delivered through headphones.
has masterfully crafted a performance and experience. The synchronicity that he has created and the artistic and theatrical tension he has facilitated are impeccable and tangible in the space.
The company has done something incredible. Each artist brings different skills, experiences, and craft to the piece; they've come together in a way that is at different times cinematic, deeply theatrical, and striking to the senses. The strength of the collaboration, both between the artists and the people and communities they interviewed, is the heart of this piece. The sound design, the backbone of the audience's experience, is depersonalizing in the way it disconnects the audience from the performers, but feels incredibly personal as remnants of interviews, actor's voices, and original and found music are all whispered right in our ears just for us.
I really enjoyed the variety of styles this piece offered and the vulnerable human hearts that are so generously presented. This piece is beautiful and emotional; I felt desperation, despair, guilt, terror, and wonder. For the parts of all of us that have experienced loss, this is an affirming meditation. I highly recommend seeing it!
