Fire Drill Scenario

Geumhyung Jeong is an extraordinary performer from Seoul, South Korea who often blends a range of performance traditions such as dance, choreography, theatre, puppetry, video, and installation. Jeong is interested in the rapport between the body and surroundings and Fire Drill Scenario explores this at length and in depth in relation to how we move and interact within a space. This work emphasises the way our imaginations construct our environments and the rituals that emanate from them.  In this performance Jeong blends theatre, video and installation all of which are conducted in a very unconventional manner. This makes her performance style and approach truly unique.

The venue for this performance becomes the central focus of the piece and Jeong examines, explores, investigates, and documents every corner of the space from every imaginable perspective in relation to a fire drill scenario. This process can appear repetitive but her deadpan and apparently mechanical delivery highlight how the human mind can obsessively develop ritualistic functions when interacting with such spaces. Jeong employs an almost robotic style of delivery which becomes strangely captivating and hypnotic. The attention and dedication to detail borders on the bizarre and becomes incredibly hilarious. However, this is not the kind of humour that will result in hearty laughter but rather quiet and somewhat sombre or destabilising contemplation.

This is an unusual performance that operates well beyond a simple theatrical experience and stimulates a whole new set of senses.

Patricia Di Risio 

Photographer: Gregory Lorenzutti