“Audi­ence mem­bers will be seated close enough to touch the per­formers and view­ers will be encour­aged to think about the ways they look at women’s bod­ies – both on film and in the flesh.”

No, that’s not the press release from Wel­ling­ton Fash­ion Week. Instead, it’s Lucrece: An Adapt­a­tion of Shakespeare’s the Rape of Lucrece, the new­est show from Binge Cul­ture Col­lect­ive. After the jump, you can read the whole press release, which includes 25 naked women but here’s the TL:DR -

Lucrece: An Adapt­a­tion of Shakespeare’s the Rape of Lucrece
Toi Poneke Gal­lery, 61 Abel Smith Street.
Exhib­i­tion: Fri­day 20 April – Sat­urday 12 May 2012, 10am-8pm week­days, 10am – 4pm week­ends
Live Per­form­ances: Thursday and Fri­day even­ings, 19, 20, 26, 27 April; 3, 4 10, 11 May, 6:30pm
Entry by koha. Book­ings: bookforlucrece@gmail.com

Theatre Women Go All Out Against Rape

Sexu­al viol­ence will be at the fore­front of Wel­ling­to­ni­ans’ minds this month with the Wel­ling­ton Rape Crisis Annu­al Street Appeal on the 13th of April, and theatre makers Iso­bel MacKin­non, Ally Gar­rett and Fiona McNamara have a busy few weeks ahead of them.

The three women are put­ting on two art pro­jects about rape in the month of April. As well as par­ti­cip­at­ing in a fun­draiser per­form­ance of A Memory, A Mono­logue, A Rant and A Pray­er, edited by Eve Ensler of Vagina Mono­logues fame, as part of the Inter­na­tion­al V‑Day move­ment to stop viol­ence against women and girls, the group will also tackle a per­form­ance install­a­tion exhib­i­tion at Toi Poneke Gal­lery, inspired by Shakespeare’s poem The Rape of Lucrece.

So far there hasn’t been a dull moment for the trio, who has been flat out film­ing video foot­age for the install­a­tion Lucrece: An Adapt­a­tion of Shakespeare’s the Rape of Lucrece. Already, film­ing has included act­or Iso­bel MacKin­non bak­ing her first ever cake on cam­era, as well as one infam­ous Sat­urday in Karori where 25 anonym­ous women gathered to be filmed com­pletely nude. Work­ing on the exhib­i­tion is a labour of love for MacKin­non, Gar­rett and McNamara who believe the poem is just as rel­ev­ant today as when it was writ­ten in 1594.

“I was struck by Shakespeare’s under­stand­ing of Lucrece, as a rape sur­viv­or” says McNamara. “His­tor­ic­ally, women have not been rep­res­en­ted on their own terms onstage, but in this poem Lucrece has a strong voice and I wanted to show that by emphas­ising that this is her story.” Women’s stor­ies are a pas­sion for both McNamara and Gar­rett, reunited after col­lab­or­at­ing on the sell out all female devised show, MINGE, at BATS Theatre in 2010. In this pro­duc­tion the focus will be on Lucrece, and her rape will be explored through audio visu­al install­a­tion and live per­form­ance. Audi­ence mem­bers will be seated close enough to touch the two per­formers and view­ers will be encour­aged to think about the ways they look at women’s bod­ies – both on film and in the flesh.

Lucrece is pro­duced by multi-award win­ning theatre com­pany, Binge Cul­ture Col­lect­ive. Already notori­ous risk takers, their pre­vi­ous work had already been described as “more a per­form­ance art install­a­tion than a play” (Theatre­view) and this innov­at­ive piece moves the col­lect­ive into a gal­lery space for the first time. It rep­res­ents a new dir­ec­tion for the com­pany, known for their image-based devised per­form­ances.