Folded and crumpled strips of paper grow into living creatures

By Tuur Devens, www.theaterkrant.nl

February 3, 2025

In the theatre of things we often see pots and pans flying through the air, many plastic items get their own breath, wooden blocks dance, ping-pong balls look at you. They are often things that could be wrapped. For its 45th anniversary, TAMTAM objektentheater chose to use only the wrapping paper itself as material, without the use of scissors, glue, stapler or tape. By only folding, tearing and creasing, strips of paper grow into animal and human-like creatures.

The table is full of wads of paper. Marije van der Sande and Gérard Schiphorst clear the table, dump the wads in a large cardboard box, the final place for all the paper. Tabula rasa is the start of an hour of playful, soft theater. A large sheet is torn off a roll of paper. The two players in black tear strips, divide pieces of paper, look at each other, each make a fish, one larger than the other. A new sheet is pulled from the roll and torn. An animal creature is created next to a human figure, a large mask is crumpled and changes into several thin Alberto Giacometti kind of people with long legs and small heads. They depict scenes of love and lust, of joy and sorrow. Anecdotes slide into stories.

I love the scenes in which the paper can be itself. Just paper. Paper that flutters in the air, that waves over the table, that sways gently. Paper that slides over the table, from roll to waste bin. Just as in the poem ‘Melopee’ by Paul van Ostaijen the canoe slides to the sea under the moon, so the paper slides past under the play of light and sounds. And just as the sliding of the canoe can only happen thanks to the rowing man, so the paper can only slide thanks to the players in black. Lovers flow into each other, birds disappear into the air, a crawling caterpillar slides into the abyss, all the wads fall into the wastepaper basket.

At other times, the paper strips folded and crumpled into living creatures create a dance performance in which they investigate their own body as a theme, analyse their movements, experiment with their moves, search for their physical limits. Strands of paper dance rhythmically on the table, float through the air, tumble, free from gravity. They spin, skate, but ultimately fall down as people, in a tearing split that is painful even for paper. Scenes slide into each other, a city emerges with a skyline of accordion-folded high-rise buildings and with busy traffic of circulating wads of paper.

Imagination and 45 years of craftsmanship – in manipulation techniques, in dramaturgy, scenography, composition – harmoniously merge here in an captivating game of paper. At TAMTAM, there are no predictable folded hats, boats or origami figures. A Paper Life is a form of pure poetry, of image, light, sound and playfulness. The computer compositions of Gérard Schiphorst with melodies, piano, percussion and all kinds of sounds organically complement the paper actions. An occasionally melancholic atmosphere floats over the table. We look tenderly, often smiling, sometimes roaring with laughter, always with amazement at the pieces of paper that may or may not depict recognizable figures and things from the surrounding reality, and go their own theatrical way.