Myke Øyne

Soft Eyes is a short and intense theater performance about the refugee crisis. The play is based on the newspaper headline "71 dead in a truck in Austria", and deals with people on the run and we who receive them. The performance meets the audience with facts, poetry and associations to the greatest humanitarian crisis of our time.

In the flood of information, it can be difficult to navigate, and one is quickly driven towards the extremes. Soft Eyes is an attempt to create a reflection space for young people, where they can process and understand the refugee flows.

The use of the truck's cargo hold provides a physical entrance to the theme. Victorian costumes, cow horns and polyphonic speech from the actors give the audience several layers to read the poetic and direct text. The truck is noisy and shaking. It's hot and you're cramped. The circumstances alone create an understanding of what too many people go through to reach the goal of a better life.

The Austrian writer Stefan Zweig wrote in one of his unpublished works: Our greatest debt of gratitude in these inhuman times is to those who affirm the human in us. To those who urge us not to abandon the most unique thing we own: our innermost self.

The project consists of a text written by Kate Pendry in light of the refugee situation in recent years. The performance is performed by four actors in the hold of a trailer.

Produced in collaboration with Scenekunst Østfold