Shelf Life: An Opera 

Premiered at Inkonst, Malmö on September, 2025

Shelf Life: An Opera is an experimental opera that explores the absurd and often invisible infrastructures surrounding our lives. Through repetition, obsession, and satire, everyday protocols are transformed into a dreamlike landscape where memory, pattern recognition, and surveillance take center stage. The piece follows characters caught in compulsive cycles: one fixated on expiration dates, another a guard navigating the edge between order and chaos. Their stories unfold in a parallel dimension—a “fourth world”—where ritualized surveillance replaces reality and infrastructure masquerades as public service. 

Concept: Matilda Tjäder, Penny Yiou Peng, Mathias Tang, Thibaut Knapp
Script: Matilda Tjäder, Penny Yiou Peng
Composition: Matilda Tjäder
Dramaturgy: Penny Yiou Peng
Scenography, light, video, installation, graphic design: Mathias Tang
Costume: Thibaut Knapp
Musicians: Angelina Petrovic (flute), Rune Kielsgaard (drums), Niklas Tjäder (guitar)
Sound engineer: Daniel Tjäder
Sound and light technician: Linus Räntfors Fredriksson
Producer: Scaling
Co-producer: Inkonst
Residencies: MARC (Milvus Artistic Research Center), Inkonst, Country Town and
Ane-Grete’s Hus in Fox-Amphoux
Supported by Region Skåne

Captured by Nikola Lamburov (photo) and Marijn Degenaar (video)