Théo Mercier

A landscape made of sand beds, and guard­ed by dogs, has been left behind by its inhabitants. Where have they gone? Sand is the central element of «OUTREMONDE» by Paris-­based sculptor and director Théo Mercier. This summer, he opens the cycle’s second chapter in Zurich: «Dream Hunters».

The theatrical works of this interdisciplinary artist focus on the performativity of images, trans­generational memory and rituals. In the first chap­ter of «OUTREMONDE», presented during the Festival d’Avignon 2021, visitors could walk through an installation made entirely from sand and wit­ness the slow disintegration of the ephemeral land­scape. The project was the first in a series of exten­sive installations on the coming­-of-­age in a post­-apocalyptic reality.

In «Dream Hunters», currently showing at Luma Westbau in Zurich, we move through the depths of the night; dream becomes reality and sleep turns into activity. In the course of the exhi­bition, which opened this June, the sand sculptures will have been transformed by growing plants and continuous erosion. During various performative activations – three of them as part of the Theater Spektakel – performers will use the sand beds and inevitably destroy them. The audience witnesses the budding friendship between a child and an omniscient dog and is taken on a somnambulistic jour­ney through slumberland – the world hidden in our beds. (ab)