THE MUSEUM OF MODERN LOVE is a new theatre work adapted for the stage by Tom Holloway, based on the Stella Prize winning novel by Australian. author  Heather Rose, which was inspired  by Serbian performance  artist  Marina Abromovic’s performance at the New York Museum called ‘The Artist Is Present’.

In the performance at the Museum gave a mammoth, performance, some 75 days long,  some eight hours a day, in the atrium, where she sat silent and still. with a small table and a chair opposite her, inviting people to sit with her and lock eyes with her  or simply  to watch from the sidelines.

Over the course of the season she met the gaze of some 1,000 strangers with many of them being moved to tears. Abramovic said,  “It was [a] complete surprise…this enormous need of humans to actually have contact.”

Rose’s novel, also set I/n 2010, sees the main character Arky Levin going tbrough a very difficult time. A renowned film composer, he, has promised his wife Lydia that he will not visit her in hospital, where she is suffering in the final stages of a terminal illness. She wants to spare him a burden that would curtail his creativity, but the promise is tearing him apart.

One day he finds his way to the Museum Of Modern Art and sees Mariana Abramovic in The Artist is Present. The performance transfixes him and it starts him on a journey to find  authenticity in his life again.

During  his odyssey he regularly visits the  Museum of Modern Art and mixes with other people who have also been transfixed  by seeing Abramovic’s  performance. Each of the charters is also  at a crossroad in their lives.

The performances  were all good. Julian Garner played Arky, Tara Morice was Lydia,  Sophie Gregg played  Jane, a tourist and a recent widow who was recently widowed and, to begin with, is interested in Arky, Aileen Huynh plays Brittika a Ducth  graduate student writing her dissertation on Abramovic, JennifeRani  plays an art critic and old friend of Arky’s and Harriet Gordon plays Lydia’s daughter Alice. Glenn Hazeldine, Justin Amankwah also give good performances.

Production values were good. The show was well directed by Timothy Jones. Stephen Curtis’  set featured screens both screens above the stage and to the sides works well. David Bergman provided the edgy soundscape .

Verdict. This production held my interest from beginning to end. I do however feel if you are going to see this production and haven’t read Rose’s novel, I would advise doing a bit of reading up about the novel and Marina Abromovic prior to coming to the Seymour Centre. Don’t go in ‘cold’, you might get lost as this is a complex piece.

THE MUSEUM OF MODERN LOVE which is playing the York Theatre at the Seymour Centre until the 30th January, 2022. THE MUSEUM  OF MODERN LOVE is being presented at the Seymour Centre as part of the Sydney Festival and the 2022 Seymour Season.

Featured image Tara Morice as Lydia.  Production photography by Ten Alphas