Six Women Standing Against A White Wall

A review from last year's Edinburgh Fringe. The problem with this piece of writing is its use of the 1st person plural-as it was a performance specifically about the individual's response to theatre, how can I possibly say that 'we' feel anything at all? Just take 'we' as a royal 'we.'

Six Women Standing Against A White Wall
Little Dove Theatre Arts
Csoco, Edinburgh, 2007

Edinburgh fringe. As a spectator of dozens of shows in intimate spaces where performers are forced to desperately seek and gain your attention, it is our responsibility to react and respond. Remember that diabolical Julius Caesar when you deliberately let your buttons clang against the metal chairs whilst making your proud exit; or those loud, slow, measured claps you delivered as tears streamed down your cheeks after watching a 50 year-old woman, tap-dancing in a wheelchair. The overwhelming amount of performers on show leads to an overwhelming amount of reactions; often we are moved, frequently we are indifferent and at times we allow ourselves to enter our safe cocoons and pretend that, as a member of the audience, we have the right to be invisible whilst a hammy Brutus or fist-chompingly unfunny comedian bears his inescapably naked soul for an hour. Six Women Standing Against A White Wall demolishes all theatrical cocoons and boldly reinstates the roots of theatre; for theatre to happen it needs an audience and by requiring them to participate we learn, and feel, how it is a profoundly mutual experience.

The concept is simple. Two times a day, six-women (on a rota of over twenty performers), encased in the characteristic white powder of Butoh dancers, slowly and ritualistically file their way through the room and take their places before, you guessed it, a big white wall. Ironically, a rope barrier hangs between the audience and the performers, reassuringly accompanied by the sign “Please Do Touch”. We are immediately reminded of Dadaist anti-art and delight in our self satisfied recognition of everything that the performance is subverting. To an eclectic assortment of music, the women stand side by side, quivering and shaking as if their bodies were about to unleash some terrible silent beast whilst they plead for touch, mouths open, arms outstretched. Once the initial satisfaction of seeing something unique at the Fringe has resided within the audience, we are left with the horrifying prospect of responsibility; it soon becomes a test of endurance. “Are they really going to stand there like this for a whole half-hour if no one gets up and touches them?” The answer is: yes, they would. But the real question is “Are we really going to sit here accidently spilling wine over the floor like this for a whole half-hour and not touch them?” The answer could, in theory, be yes, but as an audience, we are terrified of collective embarrassment and, although it took a good ten minutes, we finally gave in to our responsibility to reciprocate. The only way to truly experience and ‘understand’ this show is to go up and touch the women. When you throw away any anxieties about possible taboos you might find yourself committing, you realise that ‘touch’ and the physiological need for touch is essentially innocent and fundamental to being human. The women absorb everything that you have to offer them through touch; the less you do the less they respond. It is up to you to navigate the performance which becomes an ultimately personal and intimate experience between yourself and the performer; something that all good theatre should give us with as we participate in the ritual of performance.