LIQUID SKY is a visual theatre work exploring the meeting point of sonic art, aerial circus and laser scenography.
Audiences are immersed in an otherworldly environment that sits somewhere between an AV concert, an illusion show and a live art happening. Hypnotic movement on the ground and in the air is paired with a Dark Wave live set of throbbing synthetic hymns and mesmeric vocals from sonic artist SUE ZUKI (Alicia Mathews), creating a landscape of light, sound and suspension.
The title takes its name from both a classic laser effect—where a static beam of light intersects swirling fog to create the illusion of floating clouds—and Slava Tsukerman’s cult sci-fi film Liquid Sky, set amongst the post-punk and new-wave clubs of 1980s New York. The work draws on the film’s collision of desire, transformation and otherworldliness, alongside the collective euphoria and transcendence associated with club culture.
Influenced by Doris Lessing’s feminist science-fiction novel The Marriages Between Zones Three, Four and Five, the piece imagines a metaphysical dream-space where acts of endurance become pathways to agency, transformation and escape. Lessing’s story of a queen navigating ecological collapse, shifting power structures and hidden female communities becomes a loose mythology for the work.
Come where delight is,
High on peaks light changes, hope ranges.
How may we go there
up, up, up from this flat land,
into the high land,
that is our way…
The Marriages between Zones Three, Four and Five (Doris Lessing)
“This sci-fi-infused work is anathema to any notions of a dystopian future, instead focusing on the possibility of strength through femininity. Timely, powerful and magnificent.”
— Lorna Irvine, The Tempohouse
“Definitely performance art that would appeal to all ages.”
— Broadway Baby
“Closest I’ve ever felt to being in a science fiction film.”
— Brian Beadie, Glasswerk Magazine
“The shape of the piece moves from celestial harmony into churning confusion, surrender, and a final Indian Rope Trick ascension to serenity, before we too are raised out of the underworld through a layer of blue sky. I want to rejoin the communal rites of turning our heads to the sky and moving our bodies subtly to the beating soundscape. Liquid Sky thrilled my senses with beauty. I want more of that please.”
— Katharine Kavanagh, Circus Diaries