Monkeys

Amit Drori

Hazira – Performing Art Arena, Jerusalem

After five years of meticulous handcrafting, Amit Drori presents Monkeys, a show that explores the superhuman, which puts 12 performers on one stage – three people and nine monkey robots.

With rare creative virtuosity, Drori created a pseudo-human community in the intersection between man, nature, and machine – a microcosm that encompasses the entire circle of life: birth, youth, ageing, life and death. To a large degree, the monkey robots hark back to man’s origins, and at the same time, they also represent the ones who are increasingly replacing man – robots.

Monkeys challenges us with an imaginary, yet not altogether fictional, reality, where robotic hybrids organize as a society, forming relationships and embodying human traits like compassion, affection, and intimacy, but also cruelty and destructive desire.

A poignant look at our current point in time – on the one hand, nostalgia and yearning for wild and instinctual elements, and on the other hand, the advent of robots that supersedes the human and creates a world dominated by computer codes.

 

Directing, scenography, and monkeys construction: Amit Drori 

Co-creation, monkeys construction, and lighting design: Ofer Laufer 

Artistic development, monkeys construction, and performance: Sylwia Drori 

Mehcatronics, code and control: Zvika Markfeld @ For Real Studio 

Code and software: Zvika Markfeld, Nils Houtteman and Amit Drori 

Hardware, circuit editor: Ofer Zvik 

Sculpturing assistant: Polona Cerne 

Studio: Reut Shaibe, Eynav Rosolio, Daniel Gamlieli

 

Coproduction: Theatre TJP Strasbourg, France, Ljubljana Puppet Theatre, Slovenia, Theatre Garonne, Toulouse, France,

With the support of the Israel Lottery Council for Culture & Arts, Maison de la Marionnette, Tournai, Belgium, FEST’FACTORY Artists’ Complex Bat Yam, Israel