Jitti Chompee, renowned choreographer and founder of Thai dance company 18 Monkeys is back with another art festival, this time collaborating with Goethe-Institut, the Japan Foundation and World Performances @ Drama Chula in a series of performances that draw inspiration from the madly bizarre and surreal world of Kafka. The Unfolding Kafka Festival, taking place between Nov 12-Dec 3, aims to highlight the importance of performance art through international collaborations.

Here’s a closer look at the performances and what their artists had to say about them:

The Silence of Insects by Yoko Seyama
Nov 12-16, 5-8pm

This performance installation inspired by Kafka’s The Metamorphosis and Letter to His Father uses origami and live performance to explore the interaction between space and body.

“For this piece, I have sculpted more than 60 large origami cicadas to hang from the ceiling as mobiles while a dance performance takes place among them. I felt a reflection between the struggles of Kafka’s life and a cicada’s life, which is spent underground for years until the stage of metamorphosis, after which it only lives for a few weeks.”—Yoko Seyama

Venue: The Rose Hotel Bangkok, Soi Na Wat Hua Lam Phong. MRT Samyan

Der Bau (The Burrow) by Isabelle Schad and Laurent Goldring
Nov 19, 7:30pm

Based on Kafka’s novella Der Bau, this dance piece explores clothing as simultaneously the missing last layer of the body as well as an encompassing external space.

“During the creation process it became clear that space itself can be seen as an organ, much like an extra layer of skin. Here, it is represented through the use of fabric that serves as an amplifier to make the inner processes of the body visible to the outer—as a form that is constantly changing and transforming.”— Isabelle Schad

Venue: Sodsai Pantoomkomol Center for Dramatic Arts, Chulalongkorn University. BTS Siam. 

Cesser d’etre (Stop Being) by Laurent Goldring, Jitti Chompee and Marika Rizzi
Dec 2-3, 7pm

A performance which involves three people entering a large structure made up of strings balanced on a 40cm tall support beam. The movements of the performers are amplified by the strings that make up the sculpture itself.

“Despite the fact that this is a three-body piece, when you are inside the sculpture nobody knows whether there’s one or many of you, because you never know whose movements are being amplified. It becomes an entirely new world.”—Laurent Goldring

Venue: K Bank Siam-Pic Ganesha Center of Performing Art, 7/F Siam Square One. BTS Siam. 

Ticket prices vary according to the performance, with a Special Festival Pass granting access to all events available for B1,200. Visit www.unfoldingkafkafestival.com for the full schedule and prices.