Amin, Golberg Stavn & Trinidad // Prison Episodes

Memories, resistance, and survival intertwine in a digital and physical landscape shaped by experiences of political imprisonment.

Stage

Underhuset

Organizer

Bærum Kulturhus — Dans Sørøst-Norge

Part of serie(s)

Through dance, music, theatre, and digital technology, a physical and psychological landscape unfolds where control, fear, hope, and resistance coexist. Prison Episodes is inspired by real experiences of political imprisonment and created by Iranian composer and theatre artist Pouya Pour Amin, drawing on his own experience as a political prisoner in Tehran.

“Prison Episodes reflects on the profound and devastating realities of imprisonment, from my own and others’ experiences. Political imprisonment is a global crisis that should no longer exist. To imprison someone for their ideas and thoughts is a profound injustice.”

— Pouya Pour Amin

On stage, human bodies and digital figures meet in a landscape where the boundaries between the physical and the virtual are constantly shifting. Choreographers and performers Anne Golberg Stavn and Jens Trinidad move through a world shaped by tension, confinement, and transformation, in dialogue with actor Saba Pouyeshman and digital artist Øystein Sørum.

Prison Episodes explores how art can function as testimony, resistance, and an attempt to preserve humanity under extreme conditions.

CODA

The performance is part of the CODA Oslo International Dance Festival, October 8–18, 2026.

Festival Pass
CODA Oslo International Dance Festival 2026 offers a festival pass that provides access to all performances. Read more about the festival pass here.

You can purchase a Festival Pass here.

About Pouya Pour-Amin

Pouya Pour-Amin is an Iranian composer, performance artist, and playwright who came to Norway in 2023 as an artist-in-residence with Safemuse. His work often carries a political undertone, moving fluidly between sound, performance, and storytelling. Within the musical spectrum between classical Iranian scales and dark electronic soundscapes, he creates spaces for resistance and reflection.

Pouya has worked across disciplines for many years, with experience ranging from recording and mixing albums to composing for ensembles and developing soundscapes for theatre, performance art, film, and television. He has also performed as an actor in numerous theatre productions in Tehran and internationally.

About

Music, script & direction: Pouya Pour-Amin

Choreography: Anne Golberg Stavn og Jens Trinidad

Actor: Saba Poueshman

Digital artist: Øystein Sørum

Lighting design: Benjamin Fjellman - Bærum Kulturhus

Photography & graphic design: Aliona Pazdniakova

Lead Producer: Safemuse

Co-production: Bærum Kulturhus/Dans Sørøst-Norge, CODA Oslo International Dance Festival og Dansens Hus.

Supported by: Forestillingen er støttet av Kulturrådet
Jens Jeffry Trinidad is a Filipino-Norwegian performing and creating dancer with a background from X-Ray / UKH in Oslo, where he began dancing hip-hop in the late 1990s as part of Cre8. Jens has been employed by the Actors and Dancers Alliance (Skuespiller- og danseralliansen) since 2018 and received the Rolf Gammleng Prize in 2024.

He was nominated for the Hedda Award for Best Stage Performance in Dance and received the Gulljerven / Scenekunstbruket award for Artistic Achievement of the Year in 2025.

His solo performance SHOUT premiered in 2023. Rooted in club and street dance styles, Jens works across projects in contemporary dance and performance. He is currently developing his own artistic practice, focusing on physicality, presence, sensuality, and new approaches to movement, while actively challenging established genre conventions.
Anne Golberg Stavn is a dancer, choreographer, and educator based in Oslo. She became part of Oslo’s street dance community in 2007 and has since undertaken extended study stays in New York City and Paris. Anne is a member of the crew Deep Down Dopeizm and has previously collaborated with Hooman Sharifi / Impure Company.

As part of MUD Session Oslo, she works to promote club dance culture in Oslo through open training sessions, jams, and club nights. Her latest project, JAM—a pop-up performance disguised as a jam (or perhaps the other way around)—has been presented in more than 20 cities and towns across Norway, as well as at festivals and institutions such as Arendalsuka, Høstscena/Ålesund, Straumen Open, Multiplié Festival, Vårscena, Festspillene i Harstad, Kloden Teater, RAS in Sandnes, and National Museum of Norway in Oslo.

In 2019, she was awarded a three-year working grant from the Norwegian State Artist Grant, and in 2023 she received the performer’s grant from FFUK.
Øystein Sørum is a digital artist educated in 3D graphics at Kristiania University College, with a focus on motion capture, performing arts and installations, as well as music-reactive systems. He made his debut with an installation at Kunsthall Oslo in April this year as part of the exhibition Working On It.

Øystein also has a background in working closely with young people in Gamle Oslo, where he has engaged with drawing and graffiti. Play, improvisation, and presence are central to his artistic practice.

In Prison Episodes, he connects dance, music, and light with real-time generated digital expressions through Unreal Engine. He also uses manual control, allowing him to improvise alongside the performers in the moment.
Saba Pouyeshman is an interdisciplinary artist from Iran, now based in Oslo as an artist-in-residence with Safemuse. Saba worked as an actress in Tehran for nearly ten years before censorship and restrictions made it impossible for her to express herself freely on stage.

“I was constantly in conflict with myself while performing; I felt like a liar,” says Saba. “The more I acted, the more suffocated I felt. I walked away from acting, overwhelmed by depression.”

After several years away from the stage, she returned to her artistic practice through visual art. Her work is inspired and shaped by Persian mythology, ritual references, occult symbolism, and folklore. Working between performance and visual art, she draws on acting techniques and embodied methods to develop the characters, emotions, and atmospheres that define her work.

“Fortunately, art is more powerful than any dictatorship.”