Two stories of abandonment come to life in a courtyard. 

“I don’t think two people could have been happier than we have been”, Virginia Woolf writes to her spouse, then fills her coat with rocks and walks into the water. In her suicide letter she explains: “without me you could work”

Soraya Khalifa, the wife of renowned storyteller Rashid Khalifa, writes to him saying “Your brain is full of make-believe, so there is no room in it for facts”. She leaves the letter in his study and disappears. 

 

The two women leave.

One drowns in the river, the other disappears in a racing car with the uninspiring Mr. Sengupta. 

One was a writer, flesh and blood, the other - the fictional wife of a fictional storyteller created by Salman Rushdie in his book “Haroun and The Sea of Stories”.

One trades her presence for that of inspiration, begging her partner to resume his writing. The other, fed up with the Ocean of Notions, escapes as far as possible. 

 

Both have been with me in my journey to the “sad city” (as Rushdie would call it) - Holon. 

To a sandy courtyard between two bomb shelters. Buried under the sand, facing opposite directions, these two bomb shelters seem like ships at sea, pausing for a moment before carrying on with their journey. In the belly of the concrete an invisible landscape surges, visible only through two ventilation pipes rising through the sand. 

 

Two writers - Leonard Wolf and Rashid Khalifa - are left alone.

Baudlere says of the writer that he is like the Albatros, with wings so big that it cannot walk the earth. A monogamous bird who stays faithful to its partner, even as a widower, was once a companion to seamen in their ships, now faces near-extinction due to large fishing boats. 

 

Set in a sandbox between two bomb shelters - two performers and an Albatros tell the stories of those who were abandoned, who are now learning to walk the earth. 

For creation, because of creation, with a broken heart and tucked wings. 

 

Co-creator, performer and sound designer: Sharon Gabay

Collaborator and designer: Emily Rodeanu

Dramaturg: Ari Teperberg

Lighting Designer: Reinhard Sato (Suave)

Design Consultant: Eili Levy

Aid and support: Anna Zakrevsky, Shaul Duvshani, Mai Aylon, Laila Mazal Yenishen, Ruth Hof, Ira Shalit, Kineret Max, Shay Persil, Dana Doron

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Premiered at the 2019 Print Screen Festival, at the Center For Digital Art, Holon

With the support of the Pais Fund for the Arts