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A visually breathtaking body of work – or work of the body…Summary
Rating
Excellent
MimeLondon continues to gift us with remarkable, fascinating productions– this time hosting Spanish company El Patio Teatro, who bring us Entrañas (Insides).This exquisitely visual but quirkily thought-provoking production delights and stimulates in equal measure. A uniquely evocative piece of visual theatre, it considers the human body and explores extended ideas of what – and indeed where – it is to be human.
The set, itself reminiscent of a series of frames, is initially breathtaking because the striking lighting design creates a feeling of chiaroscuro, almost as if the stage is a living painting – perhaps a Caravaggio. It’s here we are presented with a sequence of ordinary, inanimate objects, brought alive and made quite beautiful through extraordinary contemplation.
The show is performed by duo Izaskun Fernández and Julian Saenz-Lopez in Spanish with surtitles, and their melodic accents, removed from the sense of the words in the translation, have a beautifully distancing effect, rendering the visual power of the performance all the more significant and enthralling.
Using handmade props and physical gestures, the two initially consider ideas of what a body is in terms of physical constitution. Anatomical sketches on boards are matched to their own bodies to hint at what lies beneath the skin, and immediately, a space of disclosure and discovery is established. Taking a scientific tone, they examine the literal composition of the elements of a human being, but then introduce a wealth of fascinating, eccentric facts regarding corporal mechanics – the fluctuations of the body from day to night, from life to death. It all offers an intriguing insight into how there may be more to our human existence than first appears.
This translates beautifully into magical moments of humorous, mischievous trickery and object manipulations that suggest how bodily realities can be understood differently. Magnetism and puppetry are used to animate unlikely things, and at one point, an assemblage of objects is reframed so that they are perceived in a quite different form, as an imagined aquarium complete with swimming fish. Further theatrical flourishes punctuate the production and challenge perceptions of where a body exists in space and time: a performer sinks down headfirst into the set, a disembodied hand emerges from the desk, or someone’s jacket is put in spotlight and they have existence within it although no longer present themselves.
Ideas of embodiment are further explored as the pair contemplate what a human is beyond the physically visible: how a person can exist in different objects and spaces. There’s discussion of phantom limbs, nostalgia, of scars as memory, how memories are formed and where they reside. Much of this is done using anecdotes that bring a wonderful personal and human dimension to the evening. Their warmly engaging stories interweave intricately with the more scientific content of the delivery to give a fabulously blended atmosphere of fact and imagination that leaves you contemplating truths in multiple ways, perhaps never quite settling on a conclusion, but leaving ideas suspended, like dust in a sunbeam.
Entrañas (Insides) is a quite beautiful collection of reflections on physical, cerebral and sensible ways of being. It’s a truly delightful performance that will leave you charmed and intrigued.
Artistic direction and creation, script and dramaturgy: Izaskun Fernández and Julián Sáenz-López
Lighting and Set design: El Patio Teatro
Costume design: Martín Nalda
Music composer: Nacho Ugarte
Entrañas (Insides) continues at The Pit, Barbican Centre until Saturday 10 February.
Further information and booking can be found here.
