Plastic Belly
Plastic Belly
Plastic Belly is a contemporary dance performance by Sunshine Coast-based choreographer Courtney Scheu and visual artist Itamar Freed, created with the support of dramaturge Liesel Zink.
Set to an original sound score by Harel Tsemah, and filmed on the beautiful secluded beach at Third Bay in Coolum, this work is both visually captivating and deeply sensitive to the current times.
Plastic Belly explores human connection, at a point in history when this topic is more relevant than ever. Recent experiences due to the COVID-19 pandemic have traversed the emotional and mental impact of isolation, the fear of the unknown, and a deep desire for connection.
Plastic Belly will explore the artists’ lived experience of this extraordinary time, navigating the boundaries of a new future and capturing the ever-present tension between the desire for intimacy and the primal need for self-protection. Plastic Belly is contemporary dance at its best.
Choreographer & Performer: Courtney Scheu
Visual Artist: Itamar Freed:
Performer: Nadia Milford
Film Director: Rainer Scheu (Create Right)
Cinematographer: Shane Keeffe
Dramaturge: Liesel Zink
Collaborating Artist: Chloe Lanham
About the Artists
Itamar Freed and Courtney Scheu are a visual artist and dance artist who collaborate and create work that proposes a certain narrative or fantasy that emerges from a specific site. Freed and Scheu play between reality and its artistic portrayal to create a dream like space. They are creating work across forms in dance, sculpture, video and photography. Their dance work has been presented through Supercell: Festival of Contemporary Dance. In 2019, Scheu and Freed were Artist in Residence in Everglades (AIRIE) within the UNESCO World Heritage Everglades National Park, Florida, USA. They were recently Artists in Residence in The Crow’s Nest on Chamber’s Island, Australia through the Sunshine Coast Regional Arts Development Fund.
“..a large blue tarpaulin... covers both completely, creating evocative, sometimes amoebic-like shapes, revealing one, then the other dancer, as they clamber in and out of its folds… Plastic Belly was very engaging”
Denise Richardson, Dance Australia 2020
Partners
This Homegrown project is supported by the Regional Arts Development Fund, a partnership between the Queensland Government and Sunshine Coast Council to support local arts and culture in regional Queensland.
