p l a y b i l l is very excited to welcome you to SETTING II: Sue Tompkins, the second presentation of our inaugural program celebrating the opening of our new office and archive, that will be, on two occasions throughout the year, a presentation space as well.

Following each other in quick succession, SETTING I and II are attempts to settle into our new space on Sint Jansstraat, in turn painting a picture of what is to come. While Moniek Toebosch welcomed everyone to the space with her film Welkom, gaat u zitten [Welcome, take a seat] (2000), Sue Tompkins’ presentation traverses multiple forms of documentation to present the space as a site of translation—a translation of what is happening in the theatre, of a live context to an archival one and of language from speech to script.

The presentation begins from a small painting made by Tompkins last year, in which the word ‘SCENE’ is inscribed across its surface. Creating a bridge between the vernacular of the theatre—in which play after play is staged through a series of scenes—and the naming of our presentation series as ‘Settings’, the painting draws a frame of intention: at only 20 × 25.9 cm, it is ‘setting the scene’ of the program itself.

Accompanying the painting is performance documentation from Letherin Through the Grille (2013) in the form of a video and the quintessentially Sue Tompkins binder folder—in which her performance scores are both preserved and utilised (on the occasion of their staging). As in her act at Torpedo Theater— during which a series of audio works stood in for Tompkins herself, played in rotation and negating the act of performance in turn—the expectation to perform is again evade, this time through presenting the residues left behind of a work made twelve years ago.

In the vitrine are also three typewritten text works made by Tompkins from 2022–24. AMBUSH (2022) formed the score and set the pretence for Tompkins act at the theatre—in which an ambush of spoken word filled the space—while the two untitled works were gifted to Martha Jager and Isabelle Sully of p l a y b i l l by Sue Tompkins following the act, thus becoming the beginnings of p l a y b i l l ’s very own collection. Now hanging in our new space, and therefore surrounded by our belongings and the artists that inspire us, p l a y b i l l is even more at home.