The Cave

"Elli Papakonstantinou´s THE CAVE takes us by storm with its powerful sound and visuals from the very first minute. Very much like today´s worldwide "reality": a cacophony of social media, "news," non-stop visual information, and the voices of the multiple channels of information that bombard us from dawn to dusk. But, is this "reality" or are we still trapped in Socrates´s cave?"

"The Cave" takes us by storm with its powerful sound and visuals from the very first minute…

What we perceive as reality is exactly this: our perception. We don’t know the real reality. In The Cave by Elli Papakonstantinou – ODC Ensemble, this line is continued and applied to the discussion about fake news, the influence of social media, virtual reality and the concept of ‘post truth’. The music of Mousas is more than adequate: by creating loud, thumping noise, he creates a very claustrophobic musical landscape, perfectly suited to our imprisonment in the cave. And yes, this piece raises interesting questions, for example about the concept of ‘choice’. Just as we can choose a new phone, so we can choose to believe or not believe a certain conspiracy theory. Knowledge and facts have also become a product that we can handle freely and that are interchangeable. We can ‘like’ and ‘follow’. Through the overwhelming music, the flashing images and the swirling pace, the five performers manage to take us on an exciting, but also disturbing, trip.

Papakonstantinou took the allegory of The Cave from Plato's 'Republic'…

What we perceive as reality is exactly this: our perception. We don’t know the real reality. In The Cave by Elli Papakonstantinou – ODC Ensemble, this line is continued and applied to the discussion about fake news, the influence of social media, virtual reality and the concept of ‘post truth’. The music of Mousas is more than adequate: by creating loud, thumping noise, he creates a very claustrophobic musical landscape, perfectly suited to our imprisonment in the cave. And yes, this piece raises interesting questions, for example about the concept of ‘choice’. Just as we can choose a new phone, so we can choose to believe or not believe a certain conspiracy theory. Knowledge and facts have also become a product that we can handle freely and that are interchangeable. We can ‘like’ and ‘follow’. Through the overwhelming music, the flashing images and the swirling pace, the five performers manage to take us on an exciting, but also disturbing, trip.

…A veritable bombardment of all senses. Eye, ear and not least brain fought to keep up.It's strange and beautiful, ugly and cloudy....like everyone else in the chamber, I was blown away...

“The piece redefines the meaning of contemporary musical theatre with a social message away from any reference to prosaic complaints. A substantial aesthetic event.”

“One of the best representatives of Greek avant-garde, Elli Papakonstantinou, never seizes to surprise us"

Tremendous aesthetic craft… a perfect combination of different arts…

[…] Elli Papakonstantinou does not juxtapose the ideal of the Platonic truth with the fake news era (as it is so easily made by the “valid” information providers) […] Papakonstantinou seems to imply that the solution is linked to the search for a third dimension, which will reintroduce the sense of perspective into a universe where the subject of knowledge itself is dissolved into light […]

The Cave – active and dynamic – I saw it and definitely recommend it…​

[…] I saw it and definitely recommend it. Combining new media with new opera, this is an overwhelming show of visuals and music taking us through the philosophical perspective of a suffocating, dark era. From Plato’s allegorical cave to facebook’s fake life […]

"An amazing cyber-punk new opera”