Small islands: Det Ferösche Compagnie's Castle of Joy and the theatre of the Faroe Islands
On a Faroese theatre company making work exploring the islands' myths and history.
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Pól Jóhannus Poulsen was born in 1925 in a small village in the Faroe Islands. As a young man he was bullied, and when he eventually hit back, he was sent to an institution in Denmark, a common fate for the mentally and physically disabled during this period. After returning home in 1945, the traumatised young man started to construct a world of his own, his Lykkenborg, a sprawling and uneven structure of discarded building materials, corrugated metal and broken tiles built into the hills.
The story of this outsider artist is the basis of Castle of Joy, a show by Det Ferösche Compagnie, who make work drawing on and exploring Faroese culture. The Faroe Islands are an archipelago in the Atlantic with a population of 54,000. Though self-governing, they are part of Denmark. The Faroes are, as artistic director Búi Dam points out, a small country, something which has both benefits and drawbacks for artists.
Dam quotes the Austrian artist and architect Friedensreich Hundertwasser, who once said that “the straight line will lead to downfall of humanity.” Pól Jóhannus Poulsen, who was also called Joy, hence the title, lived in a society of “straight line people” and he struggled to fit in.
While researching the piece, many of the people they spoke to insisted that Poulsen wasn’t bullied which just confirmed to Dam that he most likely was bullied. “This was a true story that contained many different stories, so we could create a story out of it,” he says. “He had become a myth in the village where he lived,” and as artist, Dam is drawn to the myth and history of the islands.
The show they ended up making is a one-woman piece performed by Kristina Sörensen Ougaard, who plays a wide range of characters, though Dam also appears in the piece as a “shadow actor”, a presence to whom she can react. This playful set design, the work of Sámal Blak, reflects the tangle and jumble of Poulsen’s creation.
Det Ferösche Compagnie was established in 2012 by a group of artists who had studied abroad, some, including Dam, in London, and wanted to “create something out of our culture, to reinvent Faroese culture.”
“We had been frustrated by the theatre scene here and we wanted to do something new, but we still wanted it to be something from the Faroe Islands, something from here,” he says. One of the consequences of coming from a small country is that we “need to fill more shoes than most.” Dam, for example, is a writer, but also a singer, musician, actor and director and this multidisciplinary approach is true of the other members of the company. “That’s why we work very collectively.” (Castle of Joy is unusual for the company in that is script-based rather than devised).
Their first performance was called A Voyage Out into the Faroes, which was based on a book from the 1770s by J.C. Svabo, regarded as the first Faroese academic, which explored Faroese myths and superstitions. Later shows included Operation Valentine, which marked the 75th anniversary of the British invasion of the Faroe Islands in 1940 and explored the impact of the British on Faroese culture.
In 2019, they created a promenade production of Hamlet. “We started with Hamlet's last words to Horatio, where he asks Horatio to tell his story,” says Dam. The production used Hamlet’s funeral as a jumping-off point. “We have a very close relationship to death and funerals. Because we're very small, if someone dies, people know them - and usually 500 people turn up for the funeral.”
The production did present them with a dilemma given that Dam is a supporter of the Faroese independence movement. It is estimated that the population is fairly evenly split between those who support and those who oppose independence. (There was a referendum in 1946, after the war and the taste of independence under the British, but it was annulled. “For 10 hours we were independent,” says Dam, “and then the Danish king said ‘no’”,) Hamlet, of course, takes place in Denmark. After some discussion, the company decided to dispense with references to Denmark from their version.
Their 2023 production of King Lear was more personal to Dam. His mother, Birita Mohr, is a celebrated actor – “the diva of the Faroe Islands” - who now has Alzheimer's. She last performed on stage in 2012, but Dam wanted to bring her back on stage, so he cast her as Lear. “It was tremendous and fantastic and crazy, but it went really well.” Obviously, she required assistance, so his father – also an actor – performed with her, helping her with her lines and her performance. “She would have these moments where she was very clear and knew what was going on, also, when she was more confused,” he said.
“There’s a journey that you go through when you create a play, a journey she had taken so many times before, and I wanted her to experience that emotionally one more time,” he said. She was still an actor, with an actor’s stamina. “We were working six hours a day and there was no problem for her at all.” And when people applauded, she knew what was going on, he says. Lear was important both on a personal level, but also as way of showing that people who “don’t have their memories can also contribute to society.”
The Faroese have a rich storytelling culture and amateur theatre was first recorded in 1780, growing in popularity throughout the 19th century, with a flourishing theatre scene in the capital Tórshavn, though it only became professionalised after the Second World War in the 60s and 70s. The first professional theatre ensemble of the Faroe Islands - Grima, which means ‘mask’ - was founded in the 1970s. They struggled in the 1990s after their grants were cut and a National Theatre was established in 2005, taking over their role. There is also an independent scene, though homegrown productions amount to around six or seven shows a year. Dam points out there is a lot of other cultural activities on the islands (including concerts in cathedral-like sea grottos, which sound amazing – “maybe we should do theatre there,” Dam muses). People also tend to have rich social and family lives, Dam says, which “also feeds into how we create our art.” (The photographer Andrea Gjestvan documented life on the Faroe Islands in her book Atlantic Cowboy, with a focus on the gender imbalance in rural communities, the social worlds of men and the different shapes family units can take in a community where men outnumber women).
The emergence of a Faroese theatre is entwined with the resurgence of the Faroese language. From 1536 the use of the Faroese language was prohibited by the Danish authorities though people continued to speak the language in private and it was preserved in ballads.
A standard written form was devised in the 1850s and modern Faroese literature began to appear in the early 19th century. Faroese became the official language of education in the Faroe Islands, replacing Danish, in 1937. Dam’s grandmother was beaten in school for not speaking Danish. It’s clear when speaking to him that he’s fervent believer in Faroese independence. “I'm struggling to make people realise that we are colonised. That our minds are colonised.” This informs the theatre he makes. Castle of Joy is part of a envisaged ‘oddball’ trilogy, the second piece of which will look at the islands’ history of slavery and the final piece will tell the story of the last woman to be condemned as a witch on the islands.
Being located on islands a considerable distance from mainland Europe does not make things easy when it comes to touring theatre. This can lead to artistic isolation. Castle of Joy is their first show to tour. “This is kind of the prototype,” says Dam. “Let's go out into the world.” They’ll be taking the show to London’s Barbican Centre from 28th February to 2nd March and to the Oslo International Theatre Festival in March. He hopes that in touring their work, he can share Faroese culture and stories more widely, but is also actively looking for co-producers and creative partners.
But first there’s the run at the Barbican to come and Dam is particularly looking forward to this. “The Barbican is my favourite place on earth,” he says. “I have seen so many wonderful performances at the Barbican by artists such as Romeo Castellucci, Robert LePage, Katie Mitchell, Ivo Van Hove, Complicité. It has shaped me as an artist. So I think I can say that performing at the Barbican is a dream come true for all of us.”
This week in European theatre
A round-up of festivals, premieres and other exciting upcoming events over the next seven days.
Figures in Extinction [2.0] But then you come to the humans – The second part of a collaborative project between Complicité and Nederland Dance Theatre sees Simon McBurney and choreographer Crystal Pite joining forces for a piece exploring the experience of living in a time of destruction. It’s at Internationaal Theater Amsterdam between 14th – 16th February as part of a wider tour.
Anatomy of a Suicide – I’m fascinated by the sound of this production of Alice Birch’s play at &, Espoo Theatre, the international theatre of Finland. Co-directed by Teatteri Metamorfoosi’s Davide Giovanzana and Sanna Silvennoinen, the artistic director of Circus Aereo, it fuses Birch’s layered text about depression and inheritance across three generations of women, with music, puppetry and physicality. It’s on until 6th March.
Heldenplatz - Frank Castorf stages Thomas Bernhard’s last play, about a Jewish professor’s return from exile with his family, splicing the text in true Castorf fashion with material from novelist Tom Wolfe’s travels through Germany in the 1930s. Apparently John F. Kennedy will also put in an appearance. It premieres at the Burgtheater in Vienna on 17th February.
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