Coppélia X Machina

Humans have always been fascinated by the idea of creating life - a vision that we seem to be getting ever closer to through developments in the field of artificial intelligence.

The world premiere of "Coppélia X Machina" by the French-Canadian choreographer Hélène Blackburn to music by Ana Sokolović is only loosely reminiscent of the ballet "Coppélia" from 1870 with its constellation of figures between man, machine and creator. This dance piece with its haunting language of movement bears much more the dark and abysmal features of the literary model "The Sandman" by E.T.A. Hoffmann.

In the process, Hélène Blackburn opens up a whole field of timelessly fascinating and at the same time highly topical questions with her abstract-associative observation: What distinguishes man from the thinking machine? Where will technological evolution take us? What place will artificial intelligence occupy in our world - or: we in its world?

We are experiencing a future society that is not afraid of progress. A tech society that takes it for granted that development and change will find their way into our everyday lives and our bodies. However, we also feel the coolness, the fast pace and hardness of this society. It is both a fascination and a warning.