MONGA is a celebration for all people who don't feel perfect. Who does? And who would feel comfortable in a society full of standardised perfection? In MONGA, Brazilian performer and director Jéssica Teixeira focuses on the brutality that social notions of normality exert on bodies. Based on the story of Julia Pastrana, a multi-talented Mexican artist who was cruelly exploited in 19th-century freak shows, she creates a mosaic of philosophical reflection, rousing songs and radical performance art. Under the glow of the disco ball and with a glass of cachaça for everyone, she invites us to distinguish myth from truth and thus avoid repeating the past.

For a long time, bodies like mine were usually killed in infancy. That's why I could never really imagine growing old. Doctors and officials told me and my family back then that I would never study, never work. But today, at 32, I can imagine living to be a hundred – because I am an artist. (Jéssica Teixeira in an interview with Lea Loeb by Theater Spektakel Zürich) 

Duration: 90 Min.