Arts Centre Vooruit, Ghent, Belgium

Could a robot recite a text by Beckett? Kris Verdonck conducts the experiment in Actor # 1, with the help of a few enthusiastic scientists. The performance is currently still in the research stage. The piece will premiere later this year, but at the game is up you can catch a preview of this mix between a multimedia lecture and radio drama.

Will we catch a glimpse of tomorrow’s drama, in which robots replace actors? Will technology win over live performers and direct communication? Aided by artificial intelligence and interactive media, Kris Verdonck succeeds in letting a computer voice recite Samuel Beckett on stage. The demonstration of the robot’s ability will be followed by a talk between a few scientists. Dramaturge Mariannne Van Kerkhoven (Kaaitheater) and Beckett scholar Dirk Van Hulle will take a seat next to Luc Steels, who conducts research into artificial intelligence, and Dirk De Ridder, who specializes in neurosurgery. Also taking part in the debate are genetics expert Jean-Jacques Cassiman, who knows everything there is to know about genetics, DNA research, cloning, and eugenics, while philosopher and mathematician Jean Paul Van Bendeghem has a love for the game theory.

Verdonck did not choose a text by Samuel Beckett by coincidence. In his work, the author asks questions about man, language and meaning. His text Lessness, for example, consists of 60 sentences that do not progress linearly, but seem to be in a haphazard order. Take the opening lines: “ruins true refuge long last towards which so many false time out of mind. All sides endlessness earth sky as one no sound no stir. Grey face two pale blue little body heart beating only up right. Blacked out fallen open four walls over backwards true refuge issueless.” Nevertheless, the human mind tries to discern a structure and a story in the text, in order to attach some sort of meaning to it.

Kris Verdonck is an artist and a dramatist. His creations operate on the border between visual art, installations, drama, performance, dance, and even architecture. Vooruit has been following Verdonck’s interesting and innovating trajectory for a few seasons now. One of the pieces he performed here was the theatrical installation I/II/III/IIII, which was selected for the Theaterfestival. He was also a member of the Commissie ter Bevordering, Bevraging en Bewaking van de Relatie tussen Kunst en Wetenschap (Commission for the Improvement, Questioning and Safeguarding of the Relationship between Art and Science), where he made the acquaintance of Cassiman and De Ridder, who now participate in Actor # 1. Earlier on in the season Verdonck visualized the end of the world in End, starring Johan Leyssen as a lone survivor, surrounded by characters that were a cross between man and robot.