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Formerly Known As

URLAND
Tue 26 Nov ’24 - Thu 28 Nov ’24
A show about artificial intelligence (AI) and the future of artists.
Tue 26 Nov ’24
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Thu 28 Nov ’24

URLAND plays with fire artificial intelligence (AI) and questions what it means to be an artist in digital times. Are we actually still needed? Boundaries are blurring. AI is everywhere, hive mind. They took our jobs! World domination. "Data overload, everyone dies."

Formerly Known As ... art?

With cloned voices and a script generated by chatGPT, URLAND uses AI. Or is AI using URLAND? Formerly Known As is a surreal, Blade-Runner-esque meta-performance that questions the shifting meaning of art. The collective works with AI to collectively make a performance about a theatre company working with AI to collectively make a performance about a theatre company working with AI to collectively make a performance about what it means to be human. Meta, yes.

A clash between creator and its creation. 'Is dit kunst(matig) of kan het weg?' (Is this art(ificial) or can it go away?) If we can no longer tell the difference between ‘real’ and artificial, what is really real? What then is art? And where creating art was unique to humans, perhaps even as that which sets us apart from other animals, AI mimics everything effortlessly and seems to be able to create limitlessly - what does that say about being human?

Prompt: “Act as an experienced, experimental scriptmaker. Search the web for performance collective URLAND. Craft a theater script for their new performance about a performance collective using AI to create their new performance. Make it a Blade-Runner-esque metafiction. Make it so that the audience can’t distinguish it from an authentic URLAND performance. Leave room for a plot twist at the end.”

URLAND embraces the unknown and has seen things you people wouldn’t even believe. All these moments will be lost, like tears in rain. Time to die.

Aftertalk 27th of november

Meet real people at the Luminaires Theater after the AI-made performance and reflect on your observations, impressions, and experiences during an interactive aftertalk. Step into the empty space and bring your stories, questions, confusions and thoughts you would like to share: How do you experience fiction, and how do you relate it to your own reality? The after talk will take about 20 to 30 minutes and will be hosted by the dramaturges, Florian Hellwig and Hana Pospíšilová. This conversation will be in English. 

  • Aftertalk 27th of november.

Credits

concept and performance Thomas Dudkiewicz, Marijn Alexander de Jong and Jimi Zoet sound design Tomas Loos and Jimi Zoet technical support Denzo Theatertechniek (André Goos) and Marcel Janssen production leaders Andrea van Bussel and Elise de Fooij graphic design Ruben Verkuylen publicity/marketing Pien Visser business management Martha van Meegen business assistant Mara Liza de Bakker production URLAND co-production Theater Rotterdam

In de pers 

"Theatercollectief Urland bevindt zich in een spiegelpaleis over kunstmatigheid en waarachtigheid, en het grijze gebied waarin die twee met elkaar aan de haal gaan." ★★★★ de Volkskrant

"De AI-plot barst van de cliché’s, maar roept wel spannende vragen op." ★★★ NRC

Over URLAND

URLAND werkt collectief. URLAND is autonoom. URLAND wil Gesamtkunst. URLAND heeft geen methode. URLAND experimenteert. URLAND is paradoxaal. URLAND bevindt zich ergens tussen kunstmatig en echt. URLAND eigent toe, citeert en samplet. URLAND clasht. URLAND gelooft in live art in digital times.

URLAND, een innovatief performancecollectief uit Rotterdam, bestaat uit Geräuschmacher Jimi Zoet, Bildermacher Marijn Alexander de Jong, Geschichtenmacher Thomas Dudkiewicz en een vaste club van strijdgenoten. URLAND maakt eclectische, interdisciplinaire voorstellingen die een clash zijn tussen verschillende stijlen, vormen en thema’s, tussen beeldcultuur en wereldliteratuur, data en dada, digitale orakels en filosofie. URLAND focust op het fundamentele, op het vertellen en theatraliseren van existentiële verhalen die de ongrijpbaarheid van het hedendaagse invoelbaar maken.