Investigating National Identity
Uncovering hereditary oppression through interdisciplinary performance and a psychoanalytical framework.
FLÓBÉR - Credits
Performance piece:
Creation, Sound Design and Performance: Telmo Branco
Performance and co-dramaturgy: Ren Mauney
Financial management: ORG.I.A - ORGANIZAÇÃO, INVESTIGAÇÃO E ARTES - ASSOCIAÇÃO
Promotional video 1: Vitor Hugo Costa / Metafilmes
Promotional video 2: Telmo Branco
Photography: Sara Corvo
Workshop's promotional photography: Telmo Branco and Ren Mauney
Editing and graphic design of posters and flyers: Telmo Branco
In collaboration with: Goethe-Institut Lisboa, Teatro Papa Léguas, Esmae - IPP, Armazém 8 and Panteras Rosa
Residency support: Polo Cultural Gaivotas I Boavista and Estúdios Victor Córdon Financial Support: República Portuguesa - Cultura / Direção-Geral das Artes and Comissão Comemorativa 50 anos 25 de Abril, Support Fundação GDA and DISTANZEN Solo - Dachverband Tanz Deutschland und NEUSTARTKULTUR
Acknowledgments: Filipa Matta, Julia Klein, Sergio Vitorino and Diana Santos - Feminist Collective As DEsaFIantes -
Documentary video (integrated into the performance):
Videography and performance: Telmo Branco
Sound design: Telmo Branco and Marcelo Schmittner
Interviewees: Sónia Latas, Odete Ortiz, Miguel Branco and Rui Brinquete.
Acknowledgments: Ren Mauney, Verónica Branco and Petr Hosek.
Full recording and editing of the performance:
Filming, production and post-production: Vitor Hugo Costa / Metafilmes
Image and sound recording assistance: Sergio Brilha
Synopsis
Dictatorial body, religious body, colonial body, family body. Oppression is a body. A vital process. Oppression is internal, anatomical, structural. Oppression integrates, lodges, incorporates itself, compresses organs, muscles, becomes a body, the body, vital, as if a new organ, or an organ that has always existed, without us realizing it, an integral part. Oppression is an ancestral routine. The oppressed oppress. Before and after are confused, forgotten. Oppressors - aren't we all? FLÓBÉR is an interdisciplinary and activist autobiographical performance that addresses the proliferation of dictatorial and colonial beliefs and practices in the family and contemporary society.
A short introduction of our work
FLÓBÉR is an activist performance that addresses the symbiotic relation between family and nation states in the proliferation of dictatorial and colonial practices.
This interdisciplinary work combines autobiographical theater, contemporary dance, sound design, and documentary film to explore the concepts of colonial love and internalized oppression.
"Internalized oppression occurs when an oppressed group accepts the methods and incorporates the oppressive ideology of an oppressor group, contrary to its own interests." Pheterson, Gail (1986)
FLÓBÉR confronts the questions: When do we become our own oppressor? When do we become the oppressor of others?
This performance explores the perspectives of two white, queer nonbinary people, one Portuguese and one US American, formerly living in Portugal. This intercontinental dialogue allows the performers to reflect the nation’s instrumentalization of the family unit, within two different cultural confinements.
FLÓBÉR utilizes documentary testimonies from the "The Tradition - The Film" (2020), which explored the aftermath of religious and military indoctrination in Elvas, a small town in Southern Portugal.
”Child soldier. Militant child. Learn. Mother - Father - God - Nation. Repeat and Learn. Mother - Father - God - Nation. Repeat. Child Soldier. Playing at wars from an early age. White Child. Your toys hurt, they wound, they show no mercy.”
- Telmo Branco, FLÓBÉR
”New leaders to tell me who I was, how to be, what to wear, to define the terms of obedience, to define the consequences of disobedience. I only knew how to use the same currency. Love as debt. You will always be in debt to those who gave you permission to live.”
- Ren Mauney, FLÓBÉR
Video footage
Trailer and promotional teasers