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Serving food for thought Chewing The Fat
Birmingham Rep Door
**** SELINA Thompson is an artist with a
strong personality and a loud voice. She wants to talk about fat, a
subject deeply personal to her and perhaps universal to us all. Dictated by the images we see around us and those
we speak to, Thompson’s performance of live art, creative writing and
performance challenges everyday perceptions of beauty and body image. She presents her view of fat in this unique and
creative piece. Thomson is part of the REP Foundry, which gives artists
like Thompson the opportunity to have their say in front of an audience. Thompson talks about her journey in a
fantastically poetic style. The whole show belongs to her alone,
including the script. In her words, Thompson gives herself entirely to
the audience so that we can completely relate to her story. Her performance starts with an unusual pre-set,
where she hands out instructions to strangers in the audience, orders
they must complete during the show, including throwing food at her while
she performs at any given time. This sets an immediate intimacy, and
Thompson’s warmth was established so that we got to know her both as
performer and as a person. Her warmth radiated the entirety of the space
and was infectious to all. The performance was vibrant and included
everybody. Thomson interacts with us all throughout, in moments of
coming out of character and talking directly to us, making sure we are
welcomed in her unique and wonderful world. We are handed
Thompson’s mind exudes metaphor and symbolism.
Her artistic use of food as props were definitely some of the most
memorable moments throughout the piece, especially when presenting us
with late night binges which consisted of playing, eating and handling
food. With this, Thompson showed the audience a deeply
personal connection which stemmed from early childhood to the woman she
presents herself as today. Her body becomes the food she superbly
describes within her speeches and the food literally becomes one with
Thompson. Thompson has a great way of explaining to the
audience about her artistic decisions. In moments that provoked gasps
from many, she accepted, and even welcomed these reactions and then
explained the importance of her bold imagery, allowing us to relive her
journey together. She gives a brave and endearing representation in
her own style of live art. It can be said that this performance is not
to everyone’s taste, as it was proved tonight with varying reactions,
but it a piece that is definitely brave to show a universal struggle in
a hard hitting way. Thompson pushes the boundaries of what we
perceive to be live art along with performance of the spoken word in
order to celebrate a culture that is constantly mocked. In her
performance, she shows that in spite of the worries that people may have
towards their bodies, we must embrace and see ourselves at face value.
From Thompson, we can gain encouragement as we see in to her imagination
and connect with not only with her as a person, but also with her story
and definitely feel the incredibly close connection she holds to that of
food, as much as she does. To 16-05-15 Elizabeth Halpin
14-05-15
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a
snack as we enter the Door and are given the opportunity to open them at
the beginning of her show. Within the performance itself, Thompson
reflects her own relationship with food and body image with striking and
bold imagery.