Please Hold - a legal fiction
Please Hold is an exploration of the aesthetics of the formal and its intimate relation to the private through choreography. The work challenges the false dichotomy between the public and the private, as formal interactions often are tied to intense emotions and taboos. Inspired by Franz Kafka’s The Trial, the performance demonstrates how the formal aesthetics of authority—through clothing, room design, or the graphic layout of a letter—can be so intimidating that its mere signal value is enough to induce compliance. The bodies on stage shift between being perceived as human, “citizen,” figure, object, subject, as well as between being seen as authority or subordinate.
Credits
Artistic director, concept, choreographer and performer: Karoline Clasen Holland
Performers and co-creators: Denise Lim, Laura Spottag
Composer: Jakob Einar la Cour ("zack christ")
Developing: Armin Hokmi, Denise Lim, Laura Spottag
Scenography and dramaturgical consultant: Anne Elmholt
Scenographic consultant: Felipe Osorio-Guzmán
Initial artistic research co-produced by: HAUT Scene, Teaterøen, and MEGALAND
Supported by: Wilhelm Hansen Foundation
Dates
2025 Det Frie Felts Festival, Aveny-T (Copenhagen, Denmark)
2025 Residency at Teaterøen (Copenhagen, Denmark)
2023 YC Festival at HAUT Scene (Copenhagen, Denmark)
Texts
Elia-Rosa Guirous-Amasse for Bad to the bone magazine
Stina Strange Thue for Bastard Blog