Flesh Dance

From the Telegraph:

A choreographer who describes himself as the "enfant terrible" of the dance world, and whose previous shows have featured scenes of simulated masturbation, is set to bring his work to Britain for the first time.

Dave St Pierre will make his London debut at Sadler's Wells next year, the theatre's chief executive, Alistair Spalding, announced yesterday.

Mr St Pierre's show, Un Peu de Tendresse Bordel de Merde, features 20 nude male and female dancers cavorting in blond wigs and will debut in June. First performed in Canada in May 2007, a polite translation of its title is: "A little tenderness for crying out loud." It is described as "leading the audience on a journey through their emotions as the performers leap with primal urgency, or lie crumpled and defeated on the ground, before climaxing in a moving finale".

"It's very lighthearted, very funny, and takes performance to its limits," said Mr Spalding. "We are not interested in shocking people. [When I first saw the show] it was like a jet plane taking off. You need that fizz."

Mr St Pierre rejects the accusation that his work seeks to shock. "My God, I've seen shows that I thought were extremely shocking but never enough to walk out," he said. "One [of my scenes] was a kind of suicide. That was reality. That was sadistic. I do theatre."

In a 2008 interview, he said: "People need time to reflect on my proposal. If people bristle at it right from the start, they won't listen. Some people don't have enough tolerance to risk listening. They're not obliged to, of course, but how do these people react when problems arise in life? Do they just turn away?" One of the choreographer's previous shows, La Pornographie des âmes, which premiered in Montreal in 2004, also contained scenes of masturbation, and members of the audience did indeed walk out. It touched on subjects as wide-ranging as "fast food and 9/11", with music by Maria Callas, Rob Zombie and Björk.

I wrote a few days ago about a show being performed this week at Dance Umbrella called Amour, Acide et Noix, which featured dancers performing entirely in the nude, and confessed an interest in naked performance (as anyone who has spotted one of my other blogs will doubtless have noted). Entirely coincidentally, Dave St Pierre, the creator of the show above was one of the original performers in Amour, Acide et Noix.

I don't know if this marks a trend in naked performance. I saw balletLORENT's show Designer Body last year, during which the dancers removed elaborate costumes until they were naked. There are several choreographers and show makers who are pushing the boundaries - Javier de Frutos also springs to mind - but this kind of performance has appeared occasionally since the 1960s.

Some of the comments below the Telegraph piece - which is essentially a reveal of the spring 2011 Sadler's Wells dance season - make it clear just how controversial naked performance still is for some people.

As for me, I'm still kind of fascinated by it. I don't think it is possibe to watch a lot of dance - especially contemporary dance - without being fascinated by the way the body moves, especially the dancers' body. I love theatricality and staging and lighting and costume, but what better way to see dancers in motion than in the nude - bone and muscle and sinew beneath skin?