Esa Kirkkopelto (born 1965) is a performance artist, philosopher and artist-researcher specialized in posthuman performance, more-than-human embodiment, and the corporeal techniques of performing. He is the founding member of the Other Spaces live art group, with which he has been working since 2004. He has worked as a professor of artistic research since 2007, in Finland and in Sweden. He is devoted to the deconstruction of the performing body both in practice and in theory.
What will be left when even Satan is dead?
– This affective mess we’re living in!
The ‘post-satanic situation’ refers to a time when affects hostile to individuals and coexistence can no longer be symbolised, meaning they cannot be associated with recognisable figures. In this time, we have become demons to ourselves and each other, and demonising the opponent has become part of everyday political discourse and social media.
But why do art and popular culture also return to demonic imagery? If we don’t believe in personal evil, why do we need the figure of Evil that intertwines nostalgia with emancipation? Would it be possible to establish a more sustainable and communal relationship with the more-than-human forces raging between and around us? How can this be achieved through dance?
The performance begins with three dancers, an actor, and a harpist finding themselves in the situation described above. This is followed by a series of choreographic events in which the invisible affective space and the possibilities arising from it emerge in various ways. A perspective of hope unfolds in the surrounding universe of death.
The performance is part of Esa Kirkkopelto’s artistic research on the performing body in a posthumanist situation.
