We gain strength. We lose power. Feel invi­ted to our muscle play. Some­thing sneaks through and gets spoi­led obviously.
Urauf­ge­führt im Künst­ler­haus Mouson­turm, geför­dert durch die Crespo Foun­da­tion, unter­stützt durch das Tanzlabor_21 und das Insti­tut für Ange­wandte Thea­ter­wis­sen­schaft Gießen. Weitere Auffüh­run­gen im Rahmen des Rough Cuts / Tanz­pan­orama Festi­vals Frank­furt, des 100° Festi­vals Berlin, des Anti­sta­tic Festi­vals in Sofia (Bulga­rien) und des Flare Festi­vals in Manches­ter (UK).
Ihre Körper legen die jungen Frauen umständ­lich in Body­buil­der-Posen. Die Asso­zia­tio­nen, die sie dabei auslö­sen, wirken an diesem Abend mit all ihren lächer­li­chen, heite­ren und ironi­schen Konse­quen­zen ausge­spro­chen erfri­schend.
Velo­city Pumps showed us the parts of the body women are so often expec­ted to hide, to neglect. We saw women with muscles, with sweat, with blood pumping through their veins not to please men but to increase and show off their strength and power. We focus on calves and lats, biceps and abs, and revel in seeing someone work so hard. But the smiles are forced, the breat­hing labou­red, the cheeks flus­hed. For us to appre­ciate the strength of these women they must put on a show for us. They must turn this strength to dancing. We must be enter­tai­ned, not intimi­da­ted. The world of the body­buil­der is one stee­ped in vanity and well-worn poses, a world that feels faintly ridi­cu­lous. This is strength with no place to go, power with nothing to be power­ful over. Once again this is fetis­hi­sa­tion of the body, though a fetis­hi­sa­tion of the body's capa­bi­lity to perform, not simply to… well, to make new bodies.