Limbo 2021

Caroling with the Goat is a ritual performed traditionally between Christmas and New Year’s Day in many regions of Romania. It’s still practiced today and has counterparts in winter Balkan traditions and winter-spring carnivals worldwide. Like other masked rituals enacted within this transition period, its role is to bring prosperity to the receiving families, the lands and animals of the household, helping to renew Time. During the traditional play in its original rural areas, at one point, the Goat must die in order to be resurrected by the performers. As a society, we are in a limbo. We see the global damage plastic has brought to the ecosystems, the effects of this addiction on the natural environment. We collectively dwell with a choice. Can we dispose of our present consumer habits and take a new turn towards more sustainable practices? Limbo is a video-eco-performance meant to draw an alarm on the current rate of plastic consumption.

Shot & edited/ costume: GCV
Perfomer/ costume: Alina Tofan
Assistants: Alexandru Claudiu Maxim, Oana Arsenoi

Limbo 2023

Every year we hope and wish each other that the holidays will bring us abundance, gifts, and goodies. What does that really mean? Discarded food, millions of waste, and disposable plastic surplus that can’t often be recycled. Although we have the best intentions during the holidays, we often end up actually encouraging (in)voluntary irresponsible consumption. Year by year, Christmas-related practices inevitably bring a different kind of plastic, in masks, props, and costumes. They are substitutes for old traditional elements and habits lost over time, either by the persistence of consumerism or by adapting them to the current context. In this respect, the collective addresses the matter through a “do-it-yourself” approach. Thus, by reimagining the ritual practiced around the new year, namely, “Goat’s Dance”, the Plastic Art performance collective aims to signal these transformations through a warning signal about waste during the festive periods of the year. By adapting the gift packages and the plastic bottles collected during the months that predate the festive period, the collective proposes a new kind of Christmas (alarm-)carol.

Performance: Alina Tofan;
Shot & Edited: Ioana Buraga
Sound Design: Ștefan Blănică ‪@Zen-Axe‬;
Costume: GCV