Homo Faber – The Origin

New tools and wonderful machines are the pride and joy of a majority of people. Half a century before Max Frisch’s novel Homo faber was published in 1957, French philosopher Henri Bergson introduced exactly this term for us tool enthusiasts. Kyoung Shin Kim, founder and choreographer of the Korean company Unplugged Bodies, takes the idea for this large group piece directly from Bergson, letting the dancers play creators and driving them all the way to the mechanics of serial production. He says that he wants “to take a look at the paradoxical world in which humans are controlled by the devices they keep producing”. In a thoughtful yet fast-paced manner, Kyoung Shin Kim illustrates the dilemma of human and machine, translating this highly topical debate into action-packed dancing with explosive imagery as he supplies our technocratic present with a new way of expressing itself.

This performance was presented in collaboration with the Korean Cultural Center in Austria, and supported by the Korean Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism and the Korean Foundation for International Cultural Exchange (KOFICE) as part of the “Touring K-Arts” project.