FOOTBALL AS THEATRE – BEAUTIFUL AND UGLY ALL AT ONCE

Returning to PICA as part of a national Mobile States tour, former footballer Ahilan Ratnamohan performs SDS1, a thrilling dance-inspired work derived entirely from the physicality of ‘the beautiful game’.

Exploring football (or soccer) as an art form, this physically charged performance has the audience living the surreal, visceral yet poetic experience of a football match. SDS1 ponders the psyche of the vulnerable warriors on the pitch striving to be loved and hated, worshipped and scorned, and through sheer athletic prowess, creates layers of movement that see the player ‘caught’ in the performance, rather than in control of it.

This is football as theatre – stripped back, extracted, frozen, repeated, abstracted.