The Theory of Love

Production still from The Theory of Love,
photo by Tomek Karwowski, 2007.

The Theory of Love, a traveling multimedia lecture-opera conceived and directed by composer and sound designer John Berendzen, is the latest offering from Portland's Liminal Performance Group.

A hybrid performance melding electroacoustic music, academic research, visual media, and group hypnosis, The Theory of Love presents an abstract inquiry into the origins, nature, and eventual future of Love. The subject is dissected into its emotional, psychical, animal, humorous, tragic, and other statistical constituents, then evaluated, diagnosed and left to the audience's imaginative interpretation.

Metaplastic developed a 60-minute, synchronized dual-screen video program for the production. The video brings together original video and photography, found 16mm and Super-8 film, and other graphic elements in a protean synthesis of didactic and poetical modalities that sometimes reads like an academic slideshow, sometimes an epic dream, often an uncanny amalgamation of the two. (See the trailer.)

In addition, Metaplastic has been the creative force behind the show's publicity, designing the advertising, the program, and other such sundry materials. Just Out magazine called our press kit the best they'd ever received, and Dmae Roberts, host of KBOO FM's Stage and Studio devoted the first several minutes of her interview with John Berendzen and the Theory cast to the press kit and its mysterious contents, which included photos, drawings, and text from the video and several phials of botanico-literary specimens.

Metaplastic media team credits

• Anna Daedalus
  • art/media director, graphic artist, performer
• Leo Daedalus
  • media/art director, video editor, graphic artist, performer
• Tomek Karwowski
  • still photographer
• Sam Miller
  • film specialist
• Kate Sanderson
  • video cameraperson

reservations and details

The Theory of Love had its Portland premiere in April 2007, appearing at three academic venues over three weekends. An abbreviated touring version will appear in the Northwest New Works series at Seattle's On the Boards, June 15–17, 2007.

more edifying links

• Theory of Love
  • the official Liminal site
• also The Theory of Love
  • another, pseudofficial site
• John Berendzen
  • the man behind the Theory
• video trailer
  • metaplastic's Teaser of Love

special thanks

Metaplastic wishes to thank the following for their generous help with the video shoots:

• Tim DuRoche
  • Portland Center Stage (PURPLE location)
• Tao of Tea
  • Jonathan Sielaff, Asia, and Ellie (RED location)
• Portland Nursery
  • William and Sean at Division St. (GREEN location)
• Kristine Gunter and Prof. Keith Karoly
  • Reed College Biology Dept. (BLUE props)
• and: Morgan Currie, Lindsay and Nita Hill, Mark Owens, Yvonne de Maat.