Performance Date

Amsterdam Fringe Festival
Brakke Grond
11-14 September

Moving Narrative is een zintuigelijke ervaring over afkomst, identiteit en de vaak ongrijpbare sporen van familie

Moving Narrative is the new documentary-theatre performance by maker and performer Amber Docters van Leeuwen.

On 20 May 2022, Amber unexpectedly received a message from her biological father, an event that irrevocably altered her life. A few months later, she met him for the first time in Seoul.

During that encounter, it became clear that her adoption had been a defining, brutal rupture in his life. What began as a meeting with a stranger from her past soon unfolded into a realization: although he may remain a stranger to her, for her seven-year-old daughter Lou, he could become a grandfather.

With Moving Narrative, Amber continues her artistic and personal inquiry into international adoption, this time from the perspective of three generations: herself, her father, and her daughter. The work poses a central question: what happens to family bonds when an entire generation is torn away?

Together with Lou, she travelled to Seoul to visit locations with her biological father, sites that hold significance for both his life and her adoption story. This journey forms the foundation for a layered narrative in which three generations embody both the fracture and the search for connection.

On stage, Amber appears alone.

In this solo performance, she constructs a live, immersive soundscape of sixteen audio speakers surrounding the audience. Voices and field recordings from Seoul intertwine with a musical composition, enveloping the public in a sonic installation that unfolds as an intimate narrative. At its heart is Lou’s voice and imaginative lens, opening a poetic space where fact and fiction dissolve into one another.

Moving Narrative is a sensory exploration of origin, identity, and the elusive traces of family. 

Note from the maker 

With Moving Narrative, the invisible legacy of adoption is made palpable: A search for origin, identity, and intergenerational resonance.

What began with the unexpected message from my biological father unfolded into a story spanning three generations: my father, my daughter Lou, and myself. In this performance, we move between speech and silence, between fact and feeling. A daughter searches for her father, a father wrestles with distance, and a child poses questions no one else dares to ask.

My artistic drive lies in making these fragile attempts at connection visible, not in order to repair what is broken, but to give presence and validity to what so often remains unspoken. Through music, sound, and story, a trace emerges that can be carried forward, by Lou, and by others.

For me, art is a space where vulnerability can safely resound, and where new relations can take shape.

Credits – Moving Narrative

Concept, Performance & Music Amber Docters van Leeuwen
Dramaturgy Aukje Verhoog
Technical Producer & Audio Installation Peter Zwart
Audio Programming/Design Rinse de Jong
Lighting Design & Technical Support Manuel Boutreur
Stage Direction Jochem Stavenuiter
Costume Design Johanna Trudzinski
Scenography Hester Jolink
Business Manager Tamara Keasberry
Marketing/Public Relations Leonie Dijkstra
Production Coordination Zarah Ruwhof
Booking Agency Huis Heerkens

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