Michael Kliën: Inauguration – A Social Choreographic Work
Photo: Christina Gangos
“I think hard times are coming, when we will be wanting the voices of citizens who can see alternatives to how we live now, and can see through our fear-stricken society and its obsessive technologies, to other ways of being. And even imagine some real grounds for hope. We will need citizens who can remember freedom: poets, visionaries—the realists of a larger reality.”
This research residency is a collaborative effort to develop the social choreographic work “Inauguration”. It aims to create a space for citizens that enables radical social imagination to emerge. “Inauguration” challenges established social norms and historical practices, revealing the artificial nature of our reality and the insanity of our doings. The title references the original meaning of augury – to predict the future from omens – and applies it to our current context: initiating a new kind of politics where citizens come together to make prophecies, making the audience feel engaged and part of the process.
The core of “Inauguration” will be a cultivated matrix of interwoven, diverse imaginings that can enrich our fundamental politics with foresight and prophecy. We will create an entirely imagined dance floor that holds everyone’s abilities, ghosts, and dreams. An analog virtual reality spreads equally across the common. Impossible worlds will emerge amongst everyone present, its metaphysical state governed by one rule only: the dignity of the other is sacred.
The first research phase was commissioned by Duke Arts at Duke University and co-sponsored by the Kenan Institute for Ethics at Duke University and the Duke Dance Program in 2024.
The research phase at Onassis AiR will include a workshop, lectures, and an informal presentation of an in-progress version of the work.
