Friday, November 12, 2021
A unique theatre performance explores what touch means in an age of lockdown
From an end to handshakes between acquaintances, to dates meeting via
Zoom, to grandparents unable to hold their grandchildren, COVID-19 transformed
how we touch. In response to this dramatic shift in human experience, in June
2021, the London-based theatre company Dante or Die created Skin
Hunger – an interactive work intended to explore touch and its vital
role in our lives. Staged at a chapel in the West End in London, the show
featured three actors sharing stories with touch at their centre. With the
performers surrounded by cascading walls of touch-safe plastic, each of these
encounters invited moments of touch between actor and audience. Skin
Hunger is documented in this short film from the UK filmmaker Pinny
Grylls, which features three audience members – a dementia care worker, a
professor of neuroscience specialising in touch, and a former prisoner –
attending the show. As they move from piece to piece, each brings their own
unique perspective on touch to the performance.
You can watch a full archive recording
of the live production of Skin Hunger here.
An audio-described version of this film is available on YouTube.
Film by Dante or
Die
Created by: Daphna Attias, Terry O’Donovan
Director: Pinny Grylls
Producer: Sophie Ignatieff
Co-producer: Anna Snowball
11 November 2021
A
unique theatre performance explores what touch means in an age of lockdown |
Aeon Videos
Fear Is The Cheapest Room In The House (by Hafiz)
Fear is the cheapest room in the house
I would like to see you living
In better conditions,
for your mother and my mother
Were friends.
I know the Innkeeper
In this part of the universe.
Get some rest tonight,
Come to my verse tomorrow.
We’ll go speak to the Friend
together.
I should not make any promises
right now,
But I know if you
Pray
Somewhere in this world-
Something good will happen. God wants to see
More love and playfulness in your
eyes
For that is your greatest witness
to Him.
Your soul and my soul
Once sat together in the
Beloved’s womb
Playing footsie.
Your heart and my heart
are very, very old
Friends.