Press Quotes The Dancing Public

 

The Dancing Public is an experiment that needs to be experienced with the body, through the body. It is all that we have missed during these last two years. And here lies the merit of this show, in it turning a story from the past into some important questions for today: would we have all taken to the streets dancing if confinement had continued? Could this be a new form of protest in our heavily policed socially-distanced post pandemic reality? Dancing manias were considered a threat to public order as crowds could be neither controlled nor explained. In this sense, this show is more an invitation to consider our relationship to social norms, to being together, to acting collectively. How we respond to this invitation will depend on who is ready to let go.

– Angela Conquet (The Conversation)

 

No one can resist the enthusiasm and energy of Mette Ingvartsen, whose performance is as relevant as it is irresistible, mixing political, scientific and historical aspects with remarkable ease. We are, from beginning to end, fascinated by her story, set in a simple scenography created together with Minna Tiikkainen and with irresistible musical arrangements designed by Anne Van de Star.

– Jean-Marie Wynants (Le Soir)

 

After Ingvartsen has dealt a further blow to nineteenth- and twentieth-century shrinkers (‘He thinks he can cure us by giving us drugs, he thinks he can cure us by locking us up’), she ends with a beautiful ambient song, hushed, referring to the repertoire of David Sylvian, Fripp, Eno. Her body disappears into the semi-darkness of the audience, only her voice lingers between thin, dull sounds. And then, afterwards, the audience reacts exuberantly.

– Fransien van der Putt (Theaterkrant)

 

Her body becomes an object of struggle, claim and liberation, in a jubilant climax.

– Delphine Goater (ResMusica)

 

A fascinating, telluric, communicative power.

– Marie Baudet (La Libre Belgique)