A NEW WORK FOR SCAPINO BALLET ROTTERDAM

In the piece GOATS by French/Luxembourgian duo Sarah Baltzinger + Isaiah Wilson, the performers are immersed in a hallucinatory world, in between pastoral satire and bestiary dream. GOATS unfolds in an absurd, Kafkaesque universe, where Gilles Deleuze’s philosophy of «becoming-animal» serves as a lens to explore contemporary alienation. On stage, the performers embody hybrid beings—half-human, half-goat—reflecting a world in which they can no longer find their place. Their only escape lies in metamorphosis, a shift toward animality that unveils humanity’s desperate search for relief from the relentless cruelty of its surroundings.

This journey takes place within a scenography that blurs the line between reality and fantasy. A surreal landscape of grass dominates the stage, evoking a pastoral kingdom both idyllic and oppressive. It is a space suspended between the sacred and the playful, where the rules of ritual and the discipline of games intersect. Viewers are left to wonder: is this a prison, a human zoo, a stadium, or a fantastical world ? This ambiguity underscores the disciplinary nature of the space, which confines the performers within its surreal boundaries while shaping their identities and actions. 

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Sarah Baltzinger & Isaiah Wilson:

« GOATS is conceived as an absurdist satire. In this new piece, we delve into the absurdity of the modern world, crafting a surreal fable where the human and animal collide. We envisioned a space where the grotesque meets the poetic, a carnivalesque satire that explores the absurdity and sometimes cruelty of a modern life. Inspired by Gilles Deleuze’s philosophy of «becoming-animal,» we sought to create a work in which hybrid figures, half-human, half-goat, attempt to escape a system that confines them through metamorphosis. These beings, figures for contemporary alienation, embody a desperate attempt to transform—to become other—in order to find a solution to a crushing world. The stage, covered in grass, transforms into an ambiguous pastoral realm. Neither a prison, a human zoo, nor a sacred space, it blurs the boundaries between reality and fantasy. This space, structured as a disciplinary dispositif, organizes bodies, imposes rules, and reflects the dynamics of power that shape the masses. Here, where the sacred and the playful overlap, it becomes an absurd playground where the mechanisms of an alienating system are laid bare. At the center of this reflection lies the figure of the goat—as a specie, as a demoniac representation and as a toy. This animal has been appropriated, in between sacred and demonized throughout myths and religious narratives : from Pan and satyrs to the scapegoat of Judeo-Christian tradition, the goat has often been reduced to monstrous projections.With GOATS, we reclaim this animal, offering it a hybrid and critical ode. »