"Marina" Dares You to Laugh at Technology

“Marina,” a new performance by Julio Torres and Martine Gutierrez, premiered at Manhattan’s Little Island as part of the 2026 Whitney Biennial program and uses comedy and spectacle to critique contemporary screen culture. Hyperallergic describes an August 26 performance at Little Island’s open-air amphitheater, where Gutierrez plays Marina, a sea-dwelling character who becomes obsessed after a construction worker drops a smartphone into the water. The plot satirizes online dating, influencer culture, and the pressure for women to seek validation, with references ranging from Homer’s “Odyssey” and Euripides’s “Medea” to “Jennifer’s Body” (2009) and Disney’s “The Little Mermaid” (1989). The staging includes video screens with wave patterns and a debris-filled underwater set, framing technology as something to be mocked rather than feared.

Read the full article at Hyperallergic