New stage productions have been taking shape at Wrap this summer, and they can be seen during the forthcoming festivals, Bergen Dramatic Festival and Dans - en fest!

Playwright, director and actress Linda Gathu has been developing a new performance called Sukker (Sugar) that explores Norway’s colonial and post-colonial history from an afrodiaspora perspective, using overlapping time zones, different spaces and parallel narratives. Sugar will premier during Bergen Dramatikkfestival.

In collaboration with scenographer Eli Mai Huang Nesse, Gathu spent several weeks at Wrap to develop the overall aesthetic framework for this piece in the Large Project Room and workshop suite.

Sugar, can be seen in Bergen on the 25th of August and tickets are available from Bergen Dramatikkfestival.

Dancer and Choreographer Malin Nøss Vangsnes teamed up with Drummer/composer Owen Weaver and our own multiinstrumentalist Leo Preston in 2020, to create the music for the dance film, Nacht [ feminine ] made by Vangsnes in collaboration with film maker Maximilian Großmann. This summer she has developed a live performance that will be accompanied by a soundtrack composed by Owen Weaver for drums (Weaver) and electric guitar (Preston). Rehearsals for this performance have taken place multiple places including Wrap. The piece will premier on the 26th of August at Studio Bergen as part of the three-day festival of dance, Dans - en fest! which is a collaboration between Bergen Dansesenter and BIT-Teatergarasjen.

Pilots/works in progress

Wrap has also hosted two groups of theatre/dance makers that have been researching and developing ideas for future work.

Dancer/Choreographer, Lisa Colette Bysheim, has been collaborating with Sculptor/Scenographer, Sophia Latysheva to develop working concepts under the title Body with I out face. With the large project room as their main space, Latysheva also made use of Wrap’s paint workshop to work with body casts in plaster and plastic. They were joined for a week by sound designer, Mike McCormick and video designer, Eirik Lie Hegre, who used Wrap’s video equipment including cameras and NDI converters (video-over-network).

A group of young theatre makers with a particular interest in Lecoq technique, spent a week in Wrap’s white room to develop ideas for a new performance under the working title Øde Jeg. The group consisted of actors Vilde Biserød Vengnes and Herman Lepsøe Ohrvik, musician William Kjeldsberg, and lighting designer Daria Zarbeeva. Vengnes, Ohrvik and Kjeldsberg all graduated from Nord University’s drama school in 2020.

The group conceived several short scenes exploring themes relating to loneliness whilst seeking to maintain a positiv and comfortable intimacy with the audience. These scenes were presented at Wrap, where Zarbeeva made use of our new LED pars and GrandMA lighting console, and subsequently at Cornerteatret, where they were able to continue working with the lighting design on a larger scale.

Upgrades

As usual, considerable time during the summer was spent working on upgrades to the physical infrastructure and feature-set at Wrap. This summer’s most significant upgrade is a set of 4 large mobile acoustic treatments that can be used as absorbers or diffusers depending on which side is used. These will be based in Studio B (the biggest studio in our AV Lab) where they provide a dramatic improvement to the sonic clarity in that space. They will also be used in the large project room for concerts and other situations where acoustics are of critical importance.