Untitled

Keep on laughing!

Dark velvet curtains flank a sparkling backdrop. Unrecognisable in his back and silver bee suit with Mickey Mouse head, dancer Marc Iglesias appears on stage to the sound of Brazilian lounge music. He waddles and jumps, a dancing cartoon.

Previously mascots were regarded as a talisman and symbolised victory. Today we only know them from the worlds of sport and entertainment. With their vocabulary of movement they encourage spectators to cheer and support the players. They look very human, but in reality there is very little about them that is human.

The mascot in UNTITLED depicts the modern slavery in which man no longer matters, as long as the system remains in motion and the audience keeps on laughing. A system of mini-jobs in which the human is hidden away behind a laughing mask and disguises his tiredness with repetitive, mechanical steps. UNTITLED is a comical and wry dance concerning a period when the individual has to be at the service of capital and when everything is ruined by entertainment.

• Untitled is Kris Verdonck’s third solo performance. Previously he created EXIT for Alix Eynaudi and M, a reflection for Johan Leysen. The performance builds on one of the figures in H, an incident (2013), based on the work of Daniil Harms.