Rehearsal for Gravity 

HD video on loop, no audio, 3:55” variable dimensions

Rehearsal for Gravity is a video choreography featuring five people of different ages. They look the spectator directly in the eye. One by one, a head falls onto a chest; two hands then cup the face and lift it back up.

Rehearsal for Gravity is part of a series of facial choreographies, Rehearsals for Being Human, developed during a six-week research process with five performers. We explored shared human experiences through the expressive possibilities of the face: emotional expression and the physical and mental mechanisms behind facial movements. These actions (filmded in one take) are not performed as representation, but carried out as real, lived movements in time. Through repetition the same movements over and over again, nuances become palpable and an underlying layer emerges. It was a rehearsal in being human.

Roos van Geffen: “Rehearsal for Gravity is about deep struggles. About trying again and again, failing, gathering courage, and starting over, no matter what. The idea for this work emerged after the birth of my daughter; a profoundly transformative experience that stirred unconscious fears and deep emotions.