KONS:O:VEL

Première: 10 April 2018, Anton Podbevšek Teater
Running time 1 hour 10 minutes. No interval.

Director Matjaž Berger

Dramaturg Kristina Ravnikar
Composer Peter Penko
Set designer Miran Mohar
Costume designers Peter Movrin, Metod Črešnar
Choreographer Jana Menger
Authors of script Nastja Vidmar, Kristina Ravnikar, Matjaž Berger
Language consultant Jože Faganel
Assistant director Kristina Ravnikar
Assistant set designer Luka Savić
Make-up designer Špela Ema Veble
Dresser Nataša Recer
Design of printed materials tiskovin Eva Mlinar
Assistant make-up designerAnita Ferčak

Translators of Kosovel David Limon, Marc Alyn, Irina Šukina, Anita Srebnik, Jolka Milič, Josip Osti…
A Small Coat interprets Toon Tellegen, Želimir Žilnik, Aleksander Čeferin, Matjaž Smodiš, Martina Ožbot …

Cast
Pavle Ravnohrib, Petra Govc, Barbara Ribnikar, Aleš Valič, Janez Hočevar, Jana Menger, Lana Voljč, Gal Žižek

The conses represent the synthesis of all my poetic effort. With the concept of cons, I wanted to mark a new phenomenon and give it an artistic meaning using unique etymology. With this concept, I indicated the transition from destruction to construction, which among all the avant-garde movements in the 1920s was most radically implemented by Russian constructivism. My passage over the bridge of nihilism needs to be understood only in this way; the same goes for my idea that each individual should only survive the age of destruction within himself. The concept and the word cons was derived from the Soviet manner of abbreviating words, which was also adopted by some European avant-gardists. Among the European constructivists, I am the only one who used the etymologically original mark for his poetic constructions, which on the one hand shows its antiesthetic position, and on the other hand, also alludes to my surname, which, as the initial letter 'K', often becomes a fine arts/engineering element in my conses. Ever since they were presented to the Slovene public, they have been stuck with the assessment that "most of them only have value as a 'time document', as commentary to various topical issues, rather than a full-blooded, permanently alive art." That sort of assessment is of course completely at odds with my intentions.

From the very beginning, the conses were intended for viewing as well as reading. It is true that all written texts are necessarily visible, but with the conses the visibility and spatiality are their essential component that dominate and therefore simply cannot be ignored. It would probably be best if I printed the conses with all the pictorial, mathematical, chemical and other signs. I was well aware of all of this, so sometimes I did not even trust my own manuscript and underlined key parts of it once, twice, or even several times; I used precise geometric drawings and increased the font of certain words or verses up to three times in comparison to other text, and even used a coloured pencil or ink, while continually keeping a watchful eye over the semantic clarity of the poems. I wanted poetry to be like architecture, whereby through movement, a poem is no longer monotonous and comes alive.