Christopher Willes & Adam Kinner, with dramaturgy by Hanna Sybille Müller. (Montreal/Toronto)
MANUAL is a one-on-one performance, presented in the UBC Okanagan library, that delves into the sensory and social life of sounds and images. Staged covertly in the library during open hours, viewers arrive on site with instructions to meet a performer at a particular time and location. From there they are led silently through a series of tiny actions together, following written notes and immersive audio in headphones. They walk through the space and listen together. They look at books and read to each other. Fragments of images, texts, and sound recordings blur into one another––reworking disparate materials into a manual for slowing down. As the piece progresses, a web of reflections emerges around the act of listening and the intimacy of reading with another person. Stepping away from the stage, MANUAL proposes a performance that takes place within the sensory encounter itself. Through a slow and careful process, this piece stages a quiet meditation on the book as a vector of shared attention. And the library as a meaningful archive of connection and awareness.