SKIN

Première 1. avgust 2020, Studio 1, Uferstudios, Berlin

Running time 55 minutes. No intermission.

Post-performance discussion with authors, moderated by Alja Lobnik. 

Authors of the concept and performers Renae Shadler, Roland Walter
Artistic director and choreographer Renae Shadler
Sound designer Samuel Hertz
Set and costume designer Judith Förster
Lighting designer Emese Csornai
Creative companion Mirjam Sögner
Production Ehrliche Arbeit – Freelance Office for Culture 
Distribution Dörte Wolter

Funded by
Hauptstadtkulturfonds (DE), Aktion Mensch (DE), Asia-Europe Foundation (SG), Goethe-Institut (AU)

Creative residences
Lucy Guerin Inc / WXYZ Studios, Bunbury Regional Art Gallery (AU)

With the kind support of
Radialsystem (DE), Theaterhaus Berlin (DE), Tanzfabrik Berlin (DE)

In collaboration with
Platforma sodobnega plesa, Zavod MOJA KREACIJA Maribor

The performance was selected for the programmes of the festivals Aerowaves Twenty21 and Tanzplattform Deutschland 2022.

Everybody has its own identity in relation to the skin. The texture of the skin changes and constantly transforms through contact with others. This applies equally to people of different abilities, ages and even to the surface of the Earth, which is shifting ever faster in the current age of the Anthropocene. Performed by Roland Walter, a German dancer with full-body spastic paralysis, and Renae Shadler, a non-disabled Australian dancer and choreographer, Skin creates a universe of its own in which their two distinctly different bodies can come closer to each other. This intimate duet transcends the performers’ physical borders to imagine a shared movement language inspired by sea anemones, liquids and the Earth’s surfaces. Skin explores new ways of relating to each other, deepening our ability to glide back and forth between different types of experiences and physicalises how our environment both shapes us and is shaped by us. Skin is not about "access" for people with disabilities but rather a work of "excess" in which multiple lived experiences co-exist. It is an attempt to make a world in which there are no more- or less-abled bodies.