Vertigo Variations

Iteration of “Vertigo Variations” of Beautiful Confusion.

Vertigo Variations is a dance performance inspired by Alfred Hitchcock’s iconic film Vertigo (1958). Hitchcock’s film, a vulnerability – acrophobia, or fear of heights – sets into motion a chain of events that ends with multiple tragedies. Hitchcock’s world and its discomfort with fragility feel familiar, even decades later. A dance with the film at the edge of oblivion and liberation, Vertigo Variations is not an adaptation of the film. Instead Beautiful Confusion Collective uses it as an impetus for reckoning with personal experiences of physical and existential vertigo and images a world where our own shimmering vulnerabilities might be the ultimate source of grounding.

How do we find our feet and move forward in a world without stability, where everything seems always to be shaking? How do we learn to live with this state, to work with it, to transform it, perhaps into something we could even begin to love?

Beautiful Confusion Collective’s interdisciplinary projects are inspired by the body and the cultural terrains through which it moves. Our work is informed by physical theatre, contemporary dance, butoh and live art. Artistic director Becka McFadden is a performer, choreographer and direction. In addition to conceiving and creating projects with Beautiful Confusion, she has collaborated with artists such as Depresivní dětí, Martin Talaga and Pinkbus Platform. She is associate artistic director of LegalAliens Theatre in London.

Co-produced by Venuše ve Švehlovce and Beautiful Confusion Collective with support from the Ministry of Culture CR and the State Fund for Culture CR.