Associate Artist Jeanne Mordoj was at Kings College Institute for one week in late November working with, amongst others, a PHD student in the French department who is studying Irish avant-garde novelist, playwright, theatre director and poet Samuel Beckett and the use of eggs in his work.

Throughout Beckett’s oeuvre, characters often crave the life-giving comfort of eggs. For example, in Watt, eggs are one of the main ingredients of Mr Knott’s soup, made to sustain him for the week, and in More Pricks Than Kicks Smeraldina Rima is described as ‘salivating slightly for a lightly boiled egg’ immediately after the death of her husband.

Jeanne’s work at Kings College Institute was part of the research and development period for a participatory installation, taking her piece La Poème as its starting point. La Poème, a joyously strange and personal play in which Jeanne slides eggs sensually on her flesh and performs animalistic contortions around her handbag, freely celebrating the feminine. It premiered at Edinburgh Fringe in 2013 and also presented as part of Currency 2013 at The Place.

During her residency at Kings College Institute, Jeanne worked with chefs and scientists to explore ideas around eggs.