Seppo Parkkinen

ANIMALIS  ( lat. ”living, that which breathes”)

Theater performance

A raven, a donkey and a dog are travelling through time – through the landscape of joint history of animals and human beings. ANIMALIS is a fascinating composition of fictional and historical elements, with episodes set in Europe and the New World between 1546 and 1735 – the world before Charles Darwin’s Evolutionary Theory.

The play has several characters: Armenian silk maker, Queen and her raven, Renaissance humanist and writer Francois Rabelais, Katariina from Lapland, peasants struggling with plague, Maria Merian, pioneer in entomology and ecological thinking, philosopher Descartes’ maid Helena Jans, slave Alzira living by the rainforest…

ANIMALIS is a collasion of images from a world filled with uncertainty, new discoveries and new ways of thinking. Both the world and humankind are facing a transformation. This change is a mysterious phenomenon also for the scientists at the dawn of the New World.

Is the anthropocentric view of the world really changing? How has our relationship with animals changed during the history? What role do myths, fairytales and religions have? Is the knowledge produced by an entomologist, and the local knowledge of Alzira commensurate? Are animals capable of suffering? What does an animal’s gaze tell us? How would animals describe humans? Where in history is the beginning of the story of the humankind?

ACTORS AND PERFORMERS: Tarja Heinula, Sofia Törnqvist, Tuula Väänänen, Raimo Karppinen and Kari Mäkiranta (musician), Sakari Kivinen (musician, cello), Liisu Mikkonen (musician, vocals)

Writer Seppo Parkkinen

Director Juha Malmivaara

Composer Kari Mäkiranta

Visualisation Pirjo Liiri-Majava and Kalle Ropponen

Graphic design Jorma Pitkonen

Photographs Robert Seger

Opening night and debut performance will be at the Manilla Old Distillery in Turku, on October 18th, 2011. (Preview on October 15th.)

PERFORMANCE DATES