In single, two types of singularity intersect: the individualism typical of late-capitalist societies and the cult of personality of an omnipotent statesman. Seven individuals live in the same flat as if each were doing it alone. In turn, each one addresses the public and speaks as if he were a servant of the Emperor of Ethiopia, Haile Selassie. All the testimonies build up a portrait of the sovereign’s daily life. In order to continue telling the story, the seven individuals gradually need to interact. They do so above all insofar as they represent events in the political sphere, particularly the fall of the Empire.

Single is based on two texts: “Cell Block, Egospheres, Self-Container: The Apartment as a Co-Isolated Existence”, by Peter Sloterdijk, and “The Emperor” by Ryszard Kapuściński. The first portrays the individual domestic universes built by those who choose to live alone; the second tells the story of the life of Haile Selassie, around whom the life of the whole of Ethiopia was organised.