Ziyuan Cui

The design aims to evoke a sense of abnormality within a domestic environment as well as to indicate the power of the wind. The wind is a key element that runs through the whole play. It symbolises the culture of the land that Medea used to be immersed in. It haunts Medea and Jason by bringing back their past memory, from which both are desperately running away.

The set captures a still moment when Jason and Medea’s kitchen is blown away by the wind. All the furniture, kitchenware, and sundry items including props are lifted or hanging as if everything is floating in the air. All the pieces are functioning, and the family can use the space as it is (e.g. open a fridge, sit on a chair), thus the space corresponds with how Medea and Jason are trapped by their past, but both seem to deal with it evasively.

The oddity of the floating kitchen gives the stage the potential to transform between the physical world that the characters live in and their psychological world. The fact that everything will hit the ground after the storm foreshadows that the family will eventually be broken too.