Unbecoming

UNBECOMING - A Tale of Deconstruction…

What happens when everything we believed in no longer holds true? Who are we when the stories that shaped us have become too confining? How does life begin after the loss of certainty?

…a solo performance blending theater, sound, and video art. Author and performer Marie Scholz developed the piece together with music producer Daniel Fahrländer as a concept album: text and sound were created in parallel and intertwine as equal narrative layers.

At the center is Sariena, a fictional character who navigates the five phases of deconstruction. Drawing on autobiographical, biographical, and scholarly research, UNBECOMING explores religious deconstruction—a process of shedding one’s skin that extends far beyond faith. It deals with loss and reorientation, with internalized beliefs, identity, and the question of what remains when familiar worldviews shatter.

“And so I stand here naked and raw,
skinned, homeless.
And grief comes like waves of salty water,
crashing against my raw flesh.”

What begins as an intimate story opens our eyes to a society in which polarization, ideological certainties, and the longing for simple answers are regaining influence.

At times lyrical, at times uncompromisingly direct, UNBECOMING unfolds a process of transformation. It is a performance about letting go, becoming anew, and the courage to rediscover oneself beyond familiar truths.

The world premiere is deliberately taking place at the FAT CAT cultural center. The encounters that took place there between artists from different disciplines made the collaboration between theater, music, and media art possible in the first place. Funding provided through the Fat Cat Sessions gave the project the space to develop its experimental approach and allow the performance to take shape in its current form.

UNBECOMING is not a story about becoming someone else. Rather, it is about peeling away, layer by layer, what was never one’s own voice.