11.09.2025 – 17.01.2026
For this work, the two collectives Total Refusal and Theater im Bahnhof have formed an alliance. Both deal with popular formats, one with commercial glossy video games, the other with contemporary folk theatre – and both use this material to reflect on the state of society. Nevertheless, the works and working methods could not be more different. One makes discursive, essayistic films and live performances, the other develops self-written theatre events about things they consider personally and politically relevant. The joint working hypothesis is that something exciting in the field of digital theatre can emerge from this mixture. Total Refusal and TiB create a weary hero live in front of the audience, who wants to lead a secluded life in the mountains of a video game – as in Henry David Thoreau’s ‘Walden’. Almost always, avatars, the main characters in video games, lead the life of the young upstart. They start out as insignificant nobodies and learn to dominate the world as the game progresses. Their steeled bodies remain eternally young and motivated, never becoming frail, insecure or ill. While more and more people in real life lack the strength to expose themselves to the political hopelessness and social hermeticism of capitalist realism, their alter egos in digital worlds can remain attentive and focused for hours on end – in English and/or German.
Let’s play I am old and tired
11.09.2025 – 17.01.2026
tib – Theater im Bahnhof
Elisabethinergasse 27a
8020 Graz
www.theater-im-bahnhof.com
