Performance art is often misunderstood. Some assume "it's just wiggling on the ground and screaming and that the pieces are all extremely provocative," says Kärt Koppel.

"But you can eat a cake without knowing the recipe," she laughs. "You can still taste it – you don't have to get how it's made. I like to invite people to experience [a performance] rather than analyze and try to understand it as soon as they enter a space."

Koppel is one member of an Estonian performing arts trio along with Liisbeth Horn and Anumai Raska. Their latest show, "Rat's Rumba," is featured at this year's Switchover performing arts festival in Tartu.

During the performance, social media, the constant presence of cameras and other aspects of living in a surveillance society are all scrutinized on a theatrical journey that asks "who is the spectator and who is really being observed?"

Clear rules

While Koppel, Horn and Raska are central to all the action in "Rat's Rumba," those in attendance also play a key role.

"For me, the audience is the most interesting part of theater or art [in general]," says Koppel. "How the audience act or behave in the situation when they encounter an art piece."

In "Rat's Rumba," the trio "played with the idea of how the audience can be the main character in the piece," while also ensuring they "don't necessarily have to act too much." Nevertheless, Koppel adds, the audience remain "very present in it."

The thought of being plucked from the audience and asked to participate in a live show would fill many with a sense of dread. Fortunately, Koppel's fellow performer in the show, Liisbeth Horn, empathizes with that feeling completely.

"Every time I step into a theater space and see that I have to be involved, I also immediately think 'no, no, no, no,'" Horn laughs. Being aware of that, she says, not only helped when structuring "Rat's Rumba" but also means they make sure those who come to see it are never put in a position that makes them uncomfortable.

"The rules [for the audience's participation] have to be really clear and also have to be brought in [to a performance] very gradually and subtly," Kärt Koppel explains.

"At first, they engage with something small and playful, then it gets more and more active. They almost might not notice that they are agreeing to the new rules we are creating in the space because they [are introduced] suddenly."

Everything is content

After beginning life as a walking tour, "Rat's Rumba" later morphed into an art installation. It then shifted forms once again to become the performance piece it is today. Still, as Horn points out, though the mode of delivery may have changed, the core ideas being explored, about what it means to live in a surveillance society and how that shapes human behavior, have remained.

Central to that theme in the performance of "Rat's Rumba" is the use of cameras and screens, which beam back recordings of the action to the audience, often from new and surprising perspectives.

"Mainly, what you can see on the screens in the piece is the audience. Research has shown that audiences tend to be very preoccupied with screens and [seeing] themselves on screens," Horn explains. The same is also true for the performers, she adds.

"During the process, we can clearly see we are way more preoccupied with our own image reflected on the screens than what's going on in real life or what's going on next to us," Horn says. "Being really obsessed with how we look from the outside, sometimes even without acknowledging it, is something screens reproduce and show us every day."

Is that experience different for younger generations who have never known a world without screens or social media?

"I have a feeling that this is quite universal in Western culture," says Kärt Koppel. "We have had more exposure to this from an early age, but that doesn't mean people who weren't exposed to it before aren't now."

"I do see a change in what is perceived as content worth sharing. It seems like right now everything can be [considered] content worth sharing, whereas beforehand when [the technology] wasn't so accessible, someone decided what was worth showing on screen," she points out.

"But if everything is worth sharing, then it just creates this abundance of visual imagery. I'm not actually sure then who the audience for this is – or are we all just creators?"

Stranger things

In exploring the often uneasy relationship between modern technology and human nature, "Rat's Rumba" certainly has a feel of the U.K. TV series Black Mirror about it.

But given the increasingly strange times we find ourselves in, it's probably not surprising to hear that much of the inspiration behind the project actually comes from everyday life.

"I think we all know about Black Mirror, but it actually rarely came up," Koppel says when I ask if that particular show had an influence on the creation of "Rat's Rumba." Instead, their ideas come from the "messed up things you hear AI is about to do, or whatever rules are [being put] in place somewhere," Horn says, as well as "this real life news that feels like a dystopia, and we're thinking: 'no, no, this can't be.'"

Nevertheless, "Rat's Rumba" is far from all doom and gloom.

The audience is certainly encouraged to "encounter their own sensations and feelings," Koppel says, about the challenges of living in a world dominated by cameras and screens. But the playful nature of the performance means they'll surely still enjoy the ride.

"We think of it as a fun piece," she smiles. "It's a bit more happy than it sounds."

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"Rat's Rumba" will be performed as part of the 2025 Switchover festival in Tartu on Wednesday, May 14 and Friday, May 16.

The performance is fully accessible to English speakers.

More information about the 2025 Switchover festival, including the full program, is available here.

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