Una Corda

Una Corda focuses on the emotional ties that we forge with the people who grapple with a terminal disease and the moments that are shared in the space occupied between life and death. It’s a ritual meditation on the spiritual and emotional effects of cancer and the experience of witnessing the destruction and loss caused by the disease. This solo show is an original rite, using rigorous physicality and stream-of-consciousness text based on shorb's experience nursing three women undergoing cancer treatment. Blurring the line between ceremony, happening, and autobiography, Una Corda asks the question: How do we not lose sight of ourselves when surrounded by loss itself?

Created by performer/writer in collaboration with director, Una Corda uses Greenberg's signature layering of choreography, text, imitation and indeterminacy alongside shorb's explorations of intimacy, failure, and frenetic action to create visceral movements, objects, and atmospheres. Drawing influences from Noh theatre, Bugaku, and Japanese Buddhist ceremonies, the ritual takes place in the liminal spaces between life and death, presence and oblivion, redemption and loss.

Full performances and excerpts of Una Corda have been presented at: The Los Angeles Women’s Theatre Festival, Oberlin College, The COLLAGE Collaborative Festival in Philadelphia, Southwestern Universiyt, Sixty in 60 Fusebox Festival Fundraiser, The Center for Women and Their Work, Blue Theatre, Co-Lab, the University of Chicago, the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, and the Alma de Mujer Center for Social Justice.

Written and performed by kt shorb; Directed by Yvan Greenberg; Dramaturgy by Kimberly Alidio; Stage Management by Kelly Marshall; Light Design by Paige Binder; Scenic painting and animation by Sarah Sage; Costuming by Irene Roderick; Poetry by Kimberly Alidio

This project was funded and supported in part by the City of Austin through the Cultural Arts Division

Press: kt shorb interviewed about Una Corda – austinlivetheatre.blogspot.com