Poor Dog Group - Dionysia

Channel B4 Media produced the above clip for Poor Dog Group, in residency at EMPAC in November of 2011.

From EMPAC site:

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Poor Dog Group: Dionysia
Half man and half horse, the wild and badly behaved satyrs were legendary companions of Dionysus, the Greek god of wine and theater. Poor Dog Group brings together ancient satyr drama, imagery, and lore to reinvent the term "satyr play."

Based on fragments of satyr plays found at Oxyrynchus—many by Euripides—and imagery on ancient clay pots, Dionysia delves into the ritualistic, unstable, and sometimes hilarious behavior of satyrs. Discarding the common Dionysian cliché of lust and drunken revels, these satyrs reach ecstatic heights just through knowing the omnipotence of Dionysus.

Dionysia retells the myth of Thyestes and Atreus, exposing the social and sexual politics of the late fifth century BC, an unstable time when law and natural order often reversed. The satyrs invade with their full-blown physical expression of the bestial qualities inherent in contemporary life, channeling forgotten rites and revealing a world both barbaric and beautiful.

 

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