Who: DARKFIELD
What: Immersive physical theatre
When: Feb 22 – Mar 20, see times here
Where: Garden of Unearthly Delights
How much: $27
Darkfield returns for a fourth year in the Garden of Unearthly Delights with their new installment of multi-sensory experiences, Eulogy. While appearing to be four plain white shipping crates dotted around the back half of the Garden, inside emulates four incredibly different mind-bending scenarios.
A new addition alongside other experiences Flight, Séance and Coma, Eulogy is unlike any of the previous installments. Darkfield presents their most disorienting and dream-like encounter yet.
Upon entering Eulogy you are sat in a metal luggage cart, wearing headphones with a mic. Before being plunged into total darkness you are asked a few yes or no questions, a component that is consistent throughout the experience. Once darkness descends, you are in a hotel accompanied by a companion guiding you in your ear, entering and exiting new floors in an elevator that sends you further down, down, down.
Words can’t properly detail the plot and emotions evoked about what happened in the darkness, but there was this distinct hallucinatory, unreal quality throughout that felt like a slow-burning almost-nightmare. The dramatic changes in the scene indicated by a thump, is not unlike that sensation of falling within a dream, and require concentration and deduction to keep up.
At a longer run time than any of the other experiences, within its 35 minute duration there was a sense of being lulled into a sleepy state, probably the only thing that keeps the fear of the dark and claustrophobia at bay.
While the other Darkfield experiences tap into unique and unlikely fears, the experience of having immaterial, occasionally unsettling dreams is universal, and something that Eulogy explores sensationally. As always, these experiences are not for the faint of heart, but if you’re up for it consider the complex surreality of Eulogy as your next Darkfield encounter.
4 out of 5
Collage 