Through a reappropriation of the Jamaican term “Batty Bwoy” (literally, butt boy), slang for a queer person, the work twists and turns the myths of the queer body to invoke demonic sensitivities and charming cruelties, unfolding vulnerable possibilities in an interplay of consciousness and naivety. Batty Bwoy attacks and embraces sedimented narratives around the fear of the queer body as a perverse and deviant figure. The expression "Batty Bwoy" is used to evoke an ambivalent being that exists on the threshold of the precarious body, liberated power, joy, and batty energy!
Artist / Company Bio
Harald Beharie is a Norwegian-Jamaican performer and choreographer based in Oslo. His choreographic practice unfolds in various constellations with other artists using dance as a medium for creating elusive spaces of ambivalence and fantasy, oscillating between deconstruction and construction, optimism and doubt, apathy and affect. With Batty Bwoy Beharie received nomination for the Norwegian Dance Critics Award in 2022, and in 2023 he won the Hedda prize for “best dance performance”.
Credits
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Choreography and performer
Harald Beharie -
Artistic collaborators/sculpture
Karoline Bakken Lund og Veronica Bruce -
Composer
Ring van Möbius -
Sound designer
Jassem Hindi -
Outside eye
Hooman Sharifi, Inés Belli
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Produced by
Harald Beharie -
Premiere date and place
20.01.2022
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Duration (minutes)
80 -
Target group
16++