Trabicula was formed as a theatre group focusing on physical theatre. It was originally an idea between Sophie Barth, Pia Aamodt-Løken, Karla Suzanne Øfjord and Thor Einar Johnsen. In order to start our theatre company, we worked on different physical methods, trying to find common ground as we all were educated different places.
We organized workshops both for adults and youth, and in the beginning of 2016 we were commissioned to create a site-specific piece about the Ice cutting business that found place at Nesodden. In the 19th century this was one of Norway’s main exports. We spoke to local historians and people living at Nesodden, as well as the woman running Villa Fredbo. They had all gathered material from archives and knew the story quite well. Thereby this lay the foundation for our script, which we also had to adapt into a family show. We were told that many people around Nesodden would be interested in seeing a show about this topic, and that they would also bring their children.
In addition to the local history, we inserted out own interpretation of the history of water, and chose short tales from Ovid. We alternated thus between two worlds: the world of 19th century Nesodden, and the mythological one which was a parallel to the world in which the historical characters were living.
We received great feedback from the audience, and we were initially planning to take it to other places but as some of the company members were students, there was no time.
Here’s some extracts from the performance (compilation of all three days), filmed by Nicolai Gundorff Asmussen (original edit – this edit is by Sophie Barth):
Isverket utdrag from Sophie Charlotte Barth on Vimeo.
Sophie Barth portfolio 