A Multidisciplinary Ritual Inspired by Max Ernst’s Une Semaine de Bonté
A visceral, ever-evolving performance for open multidisciplinary ensemble, this work draws from the nightmarish collages of Max Ernst’s 1934 surrealist novel Une Semaine de Bonté—a fractured mirror of human cruelty, psyche deviation and spiritual decay. Conceived as a living score, the piece weaves traditional instrumentation, live electronics, film, light, poetry, acting, and dance into a searing critique of the cyclical horrors of the human condition.
The composition unfolds through constellar notations, graphic and totemic representations, and vibrational resonance (Om as sonic anchor), transforming each performance into a site-specific ritual. No two iterations of the piece are alike: the materials—sonic, visual, and spatial—reconfigure themselves around the ensemble and architecture at hand, echoing Ernst’s obsession with repetition and mutation. Here, the "score" is a porous organism, devouring available resources to expose, anew, the terror and tenderness of our collective humanness nightmares.
The composition unfolds through constellar notations, graphic and totemic representations, and vibrational resonance (Om as sonic anchor), transforming each performance into a site-specific ritual. No two iterations of the piece are alike: the materials—sonic, visual, and spatial—reconfigure themselves around the ensemble and architecture at hand, echoing Ernst’s obsession with repetition and mutation. Here, the "score" is a porous organism, devouring available resources to expose, anew, the terror and tenderness of our collective humanness nightmares.
The project was premiered in 2019 in Mexico City and couldn´t reach its peak due to covid-19 times. It was performed only 6 times prior to 2020 pandemic. Audiences described the experience as a catartic, hypnotic and immersive event, like entering a dream space where the sonic environment and shadow shapes created through the lighting, collapse into a state of metaphysical prophecy.