Here we are again at the Flying Dutchman. Stuffing the rope into your partner's mouth and chucking tangled skeins on top of her isn't classically correct but there's a certain rough charm to the first act, two women.
In the spirit of this sack-of-spuds treatment, I experiment by drawing them on a continuous scroll of tawny tracing paper. Experiments can fail.
I sit among the tricoteuses. 'I'm reminding myself this is consensual,' says my friend Jacqueline, who is also drawing. She tells me that what we're hearing is German thrash metal. I'm not consenting.
There is collusion, choreography, the occasional display of faux-shame. And flashy athleticism tonight: the Italians are in town. A trim oriental-looking Russian girl in fetish stilettos ties up and suspends herself in a balletic manner. Men drip sweat and candle-wax onto their women. I've just come from
Twelfth Night at the Globe where Maria drips candle-wax on the imprisoned Malvolio.
 |
| self suspension |
I'm trying to devour what I see by drawing too much when there is constant movement. Rhythm eludes me. It's reverie at speed. I need to snatch a mood, a cry, a breath.
 |
| self suspension |
 |
| both masked |
