To be or not to be for the body. In cultural and social contexts, we closet concepts and - yet - judgments. Dirty body or in purity? Unblemished or remaining what it is in its essence? Are there universal criteria to resolve the dilemmas? For female artists, physicality, guts, digestion and excretion, blemishes, eczema and stains are important; a laboratory where physiology meets philosophy.
Spots, stains and blemishes. Hertz Haus, in its performance "To bitch or not to bitch", takes as its starting point Shakespeare's poem , "The Rape of Lucrece", but without reaching for direct representations of violence. Instead, she focuses on the traces that rape leaves on the female body and female psyche, and on the care of the harmed body.
It is also a story about the boundary separating the clean from the dirty and what can be shown in the theatre from what should not be shown.
The performance won the SzekspirOFF competition during the 28th edition of the Shakespeare Festival in Gdańsk.The award was granted for its innovative approach to Shakespeare’s work, both in terms of content (the choice of the poem ”The Rape of Lucrece”) and the form of the presentation. The jury’s verdict highlighted the original treatment of the theme of rape - avoiding direct representations of violence and instead focusing on the traces it leaves on the female body and psyche, as well as on the care for the violated body.
Performance followed by a discussion with the creative team, moderated by ESRA - European Shakespeare Research Association.
