Catchphrase

Performance focusing on the phenomena of wasteful language, highlighting the ways that empty words, phrases and sounds occupy conversations of daily life.

Composed by TiSiTi and performed with Singing Club Rotterdam.

In the first part of the performance, overheard chatter provided us with linguistic material to recycle. We eavesdropped, catching wasteful phrases and writing them directly onto our costumes, designed and sewn from repurposed fabric, in collaboration with Celine Caly.

In the second part of the performance, we vocally activated this “vacuous” libretto - the collected language written all over our costumes. We found temporary stages amongst the audience, they heard their words echoed back in an improvised and playful manner; singing, whispering, reading, repeating and declaiming.

Through this performative intervention and in collaboration with the audience, we ask, is language wasteful? And if it is, what do we hear?

Performers: Ceola Tunstall-Behrens, Ewoud van Eetvelde, Gina Borsje, Julia Rozentsvit, Lily Azur, Paqui van der Mull, Tara Reece and Tisa Neža Herlec.

Performed during the Opening of Wasteland Festival 2025.