Work Body
Michael Turinsky
Work Body
Performance
“(…) Work Body [succeeds] in being a clever, deeply moving, concert-style political performance.”
Rando Hannemann, tanz.at, 01.02.2025
Body, labour, capital – who and what is sacrificed when our value is determined by our usefulness?
A multi-layered, tender, and loud response, and a call to disrupt the logic of capitalism.
“Work Body” displays a working body – building, singing, speaking and dancing. Prize-winning Viennese choreographer and theoretician Michael Turinsky breaches the logic of capitalistic production: for a moment the separation between mental and manual labour is suspended, the normative pressure to perform replaced by the rhythm of his ‘disabled’ body, on stage invisible work is made visible. The piece is inspired by Pier Paolo Pasolini’s poem “Le ceneri de Gramsci” (The Ashes of Gramsci) written in 1954. Pasolini considers the mortal remains of physically disabled Communist thinker, Antonio Gramsci in a sensual and intellectual homage. Turinsky creates resonances between the ‘disabled’ and the ‘working’ body, bringing marginalised corporeality to the fore. Through engagement with Pasolini's text, a work emerges that demolishes the boundaries between choreographic intervention, concert and political agitation and asks pressing questions about our own working bodies and our allotted time span. Simultaneously, Turinsky responds to the increasing success of right-wing politics in working-class milieus and the underlying fantasies of masculinity. A multi-layered and memorable evening of performance and an important contribution to the current social debate on time and work in capitalism.
Tickets
Regular price: 18 €
Reduced price: 12 €
Supporters' price: 25 €
Venue
Ringlokschuppen Ruhr, Mülheim an der Ruhr
Duration
85 minutes
Discussion
13/06 Aftertalk (GER)
Language
English, with German and English surtitles