Translated material
Cows flew from Turakia
There is no plot or scenery in the view. In a strange black space, outlandish creatures made of some rubbish live. Their goals are not clear, the actions are mysterious. These are the inhabitants of the country of Turakia, which was invented by Miel Lobya from Lyon. He made the "inhabitants" and helped them appear in public.
The performance overtaken the Turakians by surprise, giving the audience the opportunity to spy on their daily classes. Turakians, remotely reminiscent of either dolls, or people, or aliens, live separately from each other. And they behave like things in themselves. In fact, these are things. Broken toys, boots carried to the holes that went out of fashion, nylon shirts, rumpled pots, torn bags ... objects were connected in an unusual manner and gained faces from dry potatoes and papier-mash. Things are swarming among things, they conduct a simple economy. They stroke their own hooks with burnt ironing iron, they repair their own tin heads with hammer blows, chasing mousetrating mousetraps (they replace mice in travel), and perform many other small useful actions. And they are surprised at every step and movement.
The performance of Michel Lobu is a chain of surprise and unexpected discoveries. Some find for a Turakik is a big event, and a meeting with a stranger is an exciting adventure. The further, the more amazing. It is worth taking a stick in the hand with attached shaggy shreds, as it immediately turns out to be a sail and a storm begins for no reason. Cows with wings made of swan feathers will fly through the sky, and the swan suddenly jumps out of the old waffle. Circular plugs will jump out of the holes in the old fence, and curious eyes will be thrust. A flying bag will lower the wood-wrapping chassis to the ground. A burenka from a painted beadon with a muzzle-boutine has breakfast with rag flowers ... And the inhabitants of Turakia, focused on their problems, will never meet with each other.
The performance of Michel Lobu, similar to a series of revived installations, is witty and charming. The bizarre Turakians accurately and concisely show their essence. A tin non-therapy, a shirt from a shirt, an unperturbed “potato” with binoculars and a dreamy miraculous-yudo in a quante dress and in a hat-durder-four entities of the same phenomenon, four facets of the same character. Maybe that's why Michel Lobya men practically do not communicate with each other. Although the performance "Four of Turakia" is very lacking in these relationships, conflicts, everyday stories, fantastic situations. Action without development is more like a performance, but a demonstration of techniques. The theater, as it turns out, is a lot of various possibilities - funny, inexhaustible, provoking future theatrical discoveries. Surely this is why the idea of the Turakians has entered the official program of the upcoming Avignon festival.
04/05/2006 / Elena Gubaidullina Material published in the newspaper No. 59 dated 06.04.2006.