Moving Narrative

Moving Narrative, the new documentary-theatre performance by maker and performer Amber Docters van Leeuwen, is a sensory exploration of origin, identity, and the elusive traces of family. 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.