When did it begin? Before time itself? The capture of Montezuma? The sack of Constantinople? The rampage of Attila the Hun? The Napoleonic wars? The destruction of Hiroshima? The Iran-Iraq war? The code of Hammurabi? We cannot say for sure. The characters you will meet have existed as specters from the very beginning. When and how do they materialize in the actor? And how do they pass from actor to actor?

BwO explores the idea of a body stripped of its vital functions in order to create a new language beyond reason. It is as much imaginary as it is emotional–yet fundamentally neither. It questions what is left when a situation has been exhausted and plays with the very idea of acting itself. BwO is a rebirth that sees several of Iraqi Bodies’ characters come to life in unpredictable settings.

It is a play within a play, within a play, within a play that passes from player to player…

We need to be bilingual, but in a single language, in a unique language… To be a foreigner, but in one’s own tongue… To stammer, but as a stammerer of language itself, not only of speech. But, here, it is in one and the same language that one must become bilingual. It is within my own tongue that I must etch a minor usage and deduct the elements of power or majority. Only when I perform a deformation of it does my tongue– both language and organ–qualify as minor.

In the end the child smiles…

Created by Anmar Taha & Josephine Gray

The performance is non-verbal and suitable for all sensing creatures.

Iraqi Bodies is based in Gothenburg since 2009, led by artistic directors Josephine Gray & Anmar Taha, the company creates performances and invites international artists to share their work through workshops, talks and guest performances.

With support from Gothenburg Arts and Cultural Affairs Committee