Tristesses

Tristesses (Sadness): if this name is in the plural, it is because Tristesses refers to a Scandinavian island, a crime thriller and a political phenomena. The island is an imaginary one, but only just. Anne-Cécile Vandalem uses it as the setting for a fable for our times. Martha Heiger, the leader of the Parti du Réveil Popular (Popular Awakening Party) is favorite in the forthcoming elections. She is returning to Tristesses in order to repatriate her mother’s body to the mainland. But what drove Ida to commit suicide by hanging herself next to the Danish flag? And what is her daughter really up to? Tristesses is also a Nordic thriller, and so we will not give away any of its secrets. Suffice to say, however, that its decor of isolated houses set against the night stage, and constant switching between onstage exterior and filmed interior moves Tristesses along to a rhythm worthy of the best crime series. Lastly, Tristesses invites audiences to reflect upon the rise of populism. According to Vandalem, “the saddening of nations and its peoples” is one of today’s most potent techniques for manipulating hearts and minds. But “the aesthetic power of these tears’, she adds, “is limitless”, unquantifiable, and “emotions can be the impulse, vector, or raw energy behind our decision to speak out or take action”. Indeed, this same energy won over audiences at the 2016 Festival d’Avignon. By exposing the mechanism of sadness and how it enslaves us all, the artist invites us never to succumb to it.