ZAJ

About the work

Voices surround me.
Advice, remarks, reactions.
Over time, these sentences begin to repeat.
They come from outside, but continue within.
It is not always clear where a thought begins.
Nor how much of it stays.
There are moments when it is difficult to decide what to believe.
Each of them can feel true at the same time —
or completely unreliable.

In this density, the question is not always what is happening, but what can shift something. Whether there is a point where the voices do not disappear, but simply lose their control.

ZAJ — the Hungarian word for "noise" — began with an interest in the different “characters” or modes of mind described by Jill Bolte Taylor in Whole Brain Living. Rather than treating these as fixed neurological categories, the studio research used them as contrasting embodied states: different ways of moving, reacting, making decisions and relating to others.

The research gradually shifted towards a more specific question: what makes one state emerge over another? Working closely with composers Abonyi Előd and Darányi Arnold, different sonic qualities were used to trigger physical, emotional and behavioural shifts rather than simply accompany the choreography.
Language entered through short fragments of thought — passing sentences, judgements and impulses that can appear almost involuntarily in the mind. The voices in the final work were provided by Hajdu Imelda, becoming another layer alongside movement and sound. These elements overlap, interrupt and sometimes contradict one another, reflecting the internal noise of shifting mental states.

Rather than defining four separate characters, ZAJ became an investigation into what provokes changes in our internal position, how quickly those changes can happen, and how they shape the way we perceive and respond to the world around us.

ZAJ was created in 2026 as part of Mind the Body and presented in Debrecen, at the Budapest Dance Festival / National Dance Theatre, and at The Festival of DANCE in Veszprém, where it received the Choreography Award and Performance Award.