A housing estate typical of ‘real socialism’: morning bus rides, standing in line at the department store, flicking through fashion magazines, the Spartakiades sporting competitions, mass gymnastics – we are in the communist era of ‘normalisation’ in Czechoslovakia, a dreary and exhausting time. On a stage the size of an old television set, outlandish designs merge with authentic details to create an atmospheric diorama of the 1980s. Uniformity, a strictly regulated and rigorously organised life – ‘Loops & Hoops’ combines paper puppet theatre and multimedia precision, nostalgia and the criticism of nostalgia, in order to portray a whole epoch as a delusionally absurd and never-ending mass event.

Visual artist and puppeteer Dominik Migač and his team combine minimalistic precision with experimental object theatre. Renowned for the sophisticated theatrical microworlds he creates, Migač and his collaborators, the director and actress Marta Hermannová and the actor and puppeteer Jan Pichler, form a trio that now share many years of working together in the same venues. The collective connects innovative forms of theatre that explores social and historical topics with a unique form of audiovisual performance, thus drawing on forms of expression that transcend boundaries.