A woman weeps. There is a piano and a pile of firewood and a video projection of trees in the snow. The woman leads us to another space. The woman weeps some more and sighs. The woman sighs some more and takes books from a trunk and clutches them to her chest, then spreads them on the floor. There are candles. Lots of candles, all over the place – which is a bit worrying in a warren of low-ceilinged wine cellars filled with wood and paper. We go to a third cellar, where is a slide-show – images of trees in the snow. We go back to the first room. There is snow on the ground. Fake snow. The woman sighs. A lot. The woman sprinkles the snow over the tinder-wood. It is fake snow so it does not melt. The End.

Context is everything. As a piece of site-responsive theatre, this piece fails on very many levels. There seems to be no relationship between the site and the content. And shuffling an audience between three cramped chambers, where people are uncomfortably trying to see what is happening (not a lot) is not really an ‘immersive journey’. A director is credited, which seems to confer the right of the reviewer to assess it as theatre. And it features a performer – albeit one to whom the director should have applied the maxim ‘No Acting Required’ at every available opportunity.

But, on the other hand, the artist Claudia Molitor is predominantly a composer/sound artist and fine artist. If I’d seen this work presented in a gallery I might have far more sympathy toward the piece. The soundscape, featuring piano, electronic composition, and German lieder, is beautiful. I like the use of slides, and the general aesthetic of the piece (barring the fake snow). If it was a fringe production by an emerging artist I’d say that it was an interesting piece that showed promise. But it has too many flaws for a work presented in a major international festival. And it is hard to understand who thought this was a good piece for a dank wine cellar below the Ship Hotel.