Maze is a work created in the intersection between choreography and sound art, developed and performed by long-term collaborators Julia Giertz and Marie Topp. The installation consists of different resonators, some made of metal, some made of wood, special constructed string instruments, speakers and movement sensors. Invited to sit in the waves of sound, the audience will encounter the archetype of an oracle. Through her gaze we experience time as something recurring, circular, repetitive and non-linear. The installation catches and responds to the movement of both audience and the performer – through this a contemplative, but dynamic sound space emerges.

We have chosen to forget what we think we know about the theatre, dance, collaboration, music, technology, community, storytelling, publicness, situation, event, intimacy, body, presence. 

We left those preconceived notions behind in order to search for their renewal.

So, as it is often the case inside the maze, we keep moving backward in order to move forward in more than one sense:

We are retreating toward death so that we can discover how to live. 

We are joining together so that we can again understand theatre.

We are engaging a resting subject so that we can recover a resonating object. 

We are reclaiming the sculptural volume of the body in order to make it dance. 

We are discovering the origin of music in sound in order to listen deeply.

We are inviting you to be invited by you.

We are seeing you in order to be seen.

Because what was before will come back again, as new

Or at least – that is our hope.

Julia Giertz and Marie Topp have collaborated for over 10 years. Together with various collaborators, they have created a series of choreographies, including performances like:  Oceanic, Hail to the Good Listener, The Labyrinth, and True Random. Since 2019, their shared works have primarily been produced by Visible Effects, a platform for choreography.

Julia Giertz is a sound artist, her practice is based on physical and choreographic aspects of sound where synthesizers, manual and electronic filters and live coding become instruments and sound sculptures. Central to her practice are the long-term, close collaborations she shares with visual artists, sound artists and choreographers such as Marie Topp, Camilla Barratt-Due and Tarek Atoui. She has participated in concerts and works at The Venice Biennale, Sonic Acts, Unsound, Kunsthal Charlottenborg, MDT Stockholm and Norrlands Opera amongst others. Since 2023, Giertz has been working as a studio engineer at Elektronmusikstudion (EMS) in Stockholm.

“To experience a billion years in one hour”, a reviewer wrote in 2021 describing a performance by Marie Topp. Her performances are characterized by their meditative and hypnotic effects on the viewer. By using slowness as a way to create hyper awareness and by building landscape-like scenarios on stage through the movements of dancers, sound and light, Topp is creating performances that hold potential for intense emotional journeys. Through artistic collaborations she makes performances that function as spaces of resonance that support sensorial encounters, embodied thinking, collective concentration and reflection. Topp has collaborated with artists such as Julia Giertz, Mårten K Axelsson, Igor Dobričić, Margrét Dara Guðjónsdóttir and Eric Andersen and others. She is associated artist at Milvus Artistic Research Center and has collaborated with organizations such as Dansehallerne, MDT Stockholm, MARC, Dansk Danseteater, Aaben Dans, Bora Bora, Inkonst, K3 Tanzplan Hamburg, Kampnagel, Inkonst, Atalante, Dansstationen. She was educated at The National School of Performing Arts in Denmark in 2009.