text: Tuomas Laitinen

 

Juxtaposing Dionysus in 69 with experiences in Reality Research Center’s Sleeping Beauty and Wonderlust Festival.

 

June 1968
Dionysus in 69, Performance Garage, NYC

Dionysus in 69, an avant-garde theatre performance by The Performance Group based on EuripidesThe Bacchae, premieres in New York City. The performance updates an ancient art work on sensuous ecstasy, divine pleasures and problematics of human condition to the 20th century. The night before the premiere, Robert Kennedy, a presidential candidate in the upcoming elections of the United States, dies in Los Angeles from the bullets of an assassin. In 1970, a film by Brian de Palma and Richard Schechner, documenting the show by The Performance Group and also named Dionysus in ’69, is released. It is a split screen documentary filmed in two shows of the performance. My access to the event is through the film, as I was not yet born at the time.

 

October 2017
Sleeping Beauty, Eskus Performance Center, Helsinki

I am sitting on a sofa in the foyer of Eskus Performance Center. A pre-premiere test run of Sleeping Beauty by Reality Research Center is about to start. The RRC website describes the show as “a participatory performance that approaches sexuality through power and role play. The performance offers an opportunity to carry out fantasies with a ‘sleeping’ person. The participant can choose to be either the sleeper or the visitor, and bring along gears, accessories or props to one’s liking.”
There are about ten of us in the audience. Performers enter. Their gear suggests eros and playfulness: revealing necklines, fishnets, some masking of facial features. Everyone, both audience members and performers, seem to be unsure of what should happen and how we should begin. It must be the first time they performed for an audience. I suspect, and later am informed, that the performers are not professional performers, but practitioners of BDSM.

 

June 2018
Wonderlust, Cirko Center for New Circus, Helsinki

All the participants of the Wonderlust Festival have been summoned to the Opening Ceremony on Friday evening. Wonderlust is “a festival celebrating diverse and conscious sexuality. Bringing together the straights and queer, sex activists and curious neophytes, kinks and shy ones, Wonderlust serves as a hub for a diverse community”. Several members of the organizing team are working professionally in the field of performing arts.
While queuing at the door, I sense a sizzling tension in the air. It is the excitement of stepping into a liminal zone, out of the ordinary. Some are here for the first time and suffer from stage fright, even though there is no stage. Some have been here before but are still hesitant to meet the disclosure and transformation that might catch them off guard. Some seem (/are/act out being) relaxed.

 

June 1968
Dionysus in 69, Performance Garage, NYC

[a chorus of ten half-naked women and men form a tunnel: the five men lie on the floor and five women stand with their legs spread apart above them. A performer starts to speak.]
Good evening. I see you found your seats.
Good evening, my name is William Finley, the son of William Finley, carried nine months by Dorothy Reinwhite and delivered by a doctor, whose name I cannot remember.
I have come here tonight for several important reasons. The first and most important of which is to announce my divinity. The second is to establish my rites and rituals. And the third is to be born. If you’ll excuse me.

 

October 2017
Sleeping Beauty, Eskus Performance Center, Helsinki

One of the performers asks me whether I would like to join her in a negotiation about a scene. I accept the offer and we move further into a more private corner of the foyer. I am a bit uncertain about how to start, what to say or even about what I want from the scene. Or rather, I am not prepared to articulate my desires, or fantasies, as the introductory text suggests. In my view, the gesture of the performance presumes that the participants reveal their fantasies and perform them, which is necessary for the act of revealing to carry significant weight, and yet the moment of speaking about the fantasy is already the climax. To start, you have to disclose and articulate, to request services or treatment or even make a confession. My choice of words is not arbitrary, since the situation resembles a reception by a therapist, a priest or a prostitute. I am performing the role of the subject, the customer, the patient, the sinner.
It seems that the first decision we need to make is which one of us is the active one, and which one is the sleeper. The sleeper will be playing sleep: being mostly passive, with eyes closed, but allowed to react to touch – like a sleeping person might react, as long as they don’t wake up. The active one will approach and treat the sleeper in a way that has been agreed upon in the negotiation.

 

June 2018
Wonderlust, Cirko Center for New Circus, Helsinki

The organizing team introduce themselves and stress several times that everything taking place at the festival is based on consent, respect and inclusion. Sexist or homophobic behavior is not tolerated. They also remind us about the code of confidence: what happens in Wonderlust, stays in Wonderlust.
Then we engage in physical warm-ups directed by one of the workshop leaders, Sadie Lune. The aim is not to warm up our bodies but the social space. We start to walk around the space and recognize each other with our eyes. We prepare ourselves for two days of encounters, touching, nudity, exposure, pain and arousal. The steps to cross the first thresholds are taken, softly and gently, with eye contact, joint movement, smiles and slight touches. Meanwhile, some people get their butts slapped in the corner and we hear a shy moan from somewhere.
The main aim of the ceremony seems to be building trust, which is crucial for the festival to work as a “hub for a diverse community”, where intimate things can be explored in the presence of strangers. Building trust in the borderland between the public and the private is not unproblematic, especially in a span of two days, but the challenges can be solved by a competent organizing team: the pressure is released through dramaturgic solution based on play and performativity.

 

June 1968
Dionysus in 69, Performance Garage, NYC

Now I…
[William Finley says while crawling into the human tunnel formed by the chorus]
… noticed that there was a little bit…
[the human tunnel are moaning loudly, as they move him slowly through]
…of an awkward silence when I announced that I…
[his voice almost drowns into the moaning]

 

October 2017
Sleeping Beauty, Eskus Performance Center, Helsinki

I decide that I want to be the active part, since that seems more challenging. But what do I want to do to her (as the mission of revealing your fantasies requires the word to, instead of with)? She helps me by telling first what she allows to be done her. I tell her that I would like to explore the boundaries of my intimate partnership with someone who is not present. How can I approach her without feeling that I am doing something inappropriate. I am especially interested in tender intimacy and touch. She says this sounds fine and clear. We conclude the negotiation.
After waiting for a while, I am summoned by the mistress who is steering the process and taking care of the safety of the performers. She re-informs me about the rules and gives an instrument with a button, which I should press if I feel the need to interrupt the encounter. This would invite the immediate entry of a third party and the encounter would be discontinued. The performer has a similar device.

 

June 2018
Wonderlust, Cirko Center for New Circus, Helsinki

Sadie Lune, while leading the Loving Domination workshop, reveals the butt of the person who volunteered as a submissive party for an domination scene demonstration. Sadie Lune humiliates the volunteer, exposing not just the volunteer’s butt, but their shame to the audience, meaning us, the participants of the workshop.
There is a strong sense of trust in the air. The volunteer is experienced, they know what they want, what turns them on, and they are brave enough to act it out in front of us. The title of the workshop fits perfectly – Lune dominates them with love. The scene makes it obvious why BDSM practices are so often linked with performing arts. The play with power, hiding vs. showing and interpersonal connection are some of the key elements of any basic drama workshop. The difference lies in the fact that in the theater, the teleological subject of the experience is the witness (the motivation of rehearsals is eventual encounter with an audience), while here subject is the actor (the scenes might have an audience, but it is irrelevant as the ones who take part in the action aim for their own, and other actor’s, pleasure).
Lune is charming: confident, articulate, grown-up, experienced and not arrogant. A big portion of the workshop is spent in discussion. Lune tells about her work as a domina, prostitute and artist, she enlightens us about the basics of power play and especially domination and answers questions. At times we also pair up with strangers and engage in small exercises that deal with bodily contact and using force against another person. For example, we apply pressure to different parts of our pair’s body. Pairing up is a possible and slightly scary playground of inclusion and exclusion, as we walk around the room and try to connect with someone. It isn’t always easy, and when I am one of the last who are left without a pair, I wonder why I am not wanted.

 

June 1968
Dionysus in 69, Performance Garage, NYC

… was the a… the divinity you see, it really should be a clear need for this because it’s important to remember that what you are watching now is a…
[the moaning mothers pull William Finley out of the other end of the tunnel]
… kind of performance and my name is William Finley and what you are seeing is, in fact, a birth.
[the tunnel quiets down]
And here I am. Dionysus once again.

 

October 2017
Sleeping Beauty, Eskus Performance Center, Helsinki

Then it is time for me to enter the room. She is lying on her back on a large mattress on the floor. She is wearing a silk nightgown. Her head tilted on the side, her breath slow and calm. Her eyes closed. Between the door and the mattress there is a table with some equipment: condoms, dildos and such. This wakes up my imagination. I imagine fingers in a condom sliding inside a vagina. I imagine lying on the mattress and feeling a dildo pushed into my anus. Then I come back to the reality of my choices, but stay aware of what may take place in the room after we are finished.
I focus on her again. She is beautiful. I sit on the mattress beside her and let my gaze wonder on her body for a while. Even this is a rare pleasure: to be able to look at an unfamiliar, exposed, intentionally erotic and consenting body unhurriedly, with no distractions or disturbance. She is here just for me, for my eyes to wander on her face, breasts, belly, thighs. There are no expectations. I do not need to satisfy her. I do not need to satisfy anyone’s expectations. I can just look at her for half an hour, if I want.

 

June 2018
Wonderlust, Eskus Performance Center, Helsinki

Afton, Ceci Ferox and Nana, the leaders of the Impact Play workshop, remind us about the ethical rules: about the non-sexist, non-offensive, non-homophobic language, action and communication. I am happy of these rules and at the same time I am wondering, if we really need to repeat them over and over again. It feels slightly patronizing.
Also in this workshop, we spend quite a lot of time on talking, which alternates with sessions of slapping, hitting and kicking each other. Afton, Ceci Ferox and Nana share techniques, specific qualities of different tools and their own inclinations. They seem like an exclusive club of sorts; they get frequently together to hurt each other. The tools are there for us to experiment with: floggers, whips, bats and so on. I reveal my back and bend over. Sharp pain shoots through my nerves to the brain and back. Again. I also take the role of inflicting pain, aiming for the big muscles with strength and for the sensitive parts with precision. A beautiful and lively soundscape of slaps, spanks, whacks, moans and screams slowly builds up in the room.
What is at stake here are politics of the body in their sincerely complex form: one can exercise one’s agency by laying on the floor and receiving blows of a baseball bat. This feels like practical, yet privileged, activism against binary simplifications habitual for the contemporary political sphere. Being battered is empowering when you have the luxury of choosing it.

 

June 1968
Dionysus in ‘69, Performance Garage, NYC

[Dionysus/William Finley addresses the audience]
Now, for those of you who agree with what I just told you, that I am the god, you are gonna have a wonderful time tonight. As for the rest of you, as for the rest of you, you are gonna be in for an hour and a half of being up against the wall.
If you did agree and believe what I just said, you can join us in what we do next, which is called an “ecstasy”. It’s a dance for joy, in honor of me, the god and his birthday party.
[ecstatic dance and stripping of clothes follows, by both the performers and some members of the audience]

 

October 2017
Sleeping Beauty, Eskus Performance Center, Helsinki

This asymmetric encounter is a fine example of the expansion of the forms of performing arts. Though it draws material and inspiration from the realm of sexual practices, I would not place it anywhere else than in the arts. For one, the authors present it as art. But it is not only the framing but also the aesthetic coding in which the frame is grounded: the piece does not seem to invite me to just fulfill my erotic desires. It is more ambiguous and open in its proposal, and I do not feel like a customer. I am the active part of the encounter, but the receiver in regard to the whole of the piece. The performer performs and I am an audience member.
Like Wonderlust, Sleeping Beauty is based on confidentiality. It is the veil of secrecy that creates a mysterious aura around it and opens a second stage in the imaginary realm. Writing about it might mean that you end up meddling with the logic of the piece. And here we are, writing and reading. How to write about a piece that it built on (the presumption of) secrecy? It is a relevant problem in the case of these specific aesthetics. What happened in the room? Did I give a truthful account of the events? If I didn’t, does it matter? How to respect both the disclosure it demands and the confidentiality it fosters?
The encounter ends sooner than I would expect and I exit the room. This possibility to self-inquiry feels like a gift when it is over. The show (sic!) ends with a discussion between myself and the performer. We part in concord.

 

June 2018
Wonderlust, Cirko Center for New Circus, Helsinki

The festival ends with a Play Party. In the context of BDSM, Play Party means a free-form gathering, a party, where the focus is not on music, dancing, drinking and drugs, as in most parties, but in different sexual encounters, practices and improvisations. “Play”. There is a sort of no-streetwear-dresscode, and the participants are playful in using the stereotypical BDSM imagery like leather, rubber, fishnets and corsets, but also anything else, as long as there is an element of eroticism and seduction.
The space is furnished with pillows, mattresses and other soft things to linger and play on, and with some drapes dividing the space into a few quarters. There is about a hundred of us, hanging around the space in pairs and groups: talking, kissing, laughing, flogging, tying each other up, fucking. I feel sexy, excited, protective, generous, playful, performative, comfortable, uncomfortable, aroused. It is an extremely alternative social space in any scale of normality in the public sphere of contemporary Helsinki. It reveals how strong the conventions of intimacy and the ways of organizing shame are. This would be frowned upon or resented by most and yet the atmosphere is peaceful, beautiful, non-offensive and liberated. Why frown upon that?
As it is partly organized and there are some professional performing artists in the audience, one cannot help but wonder how live art and its parallel arts are present. You play with experimental social dynamics. You use roles. You engage in bodily encounters. You structure the events with scores and rules. You create tensions through sculpting relational aesthetics. You contrast control and uncontrollability. You let go. You take the position of a spectator. There are plenty of similarities.
And yet, if I stroll around at the party looking at the acts as performances, I start feeling like a colonizer. Everybody is of course allowed to behave here in the way they want as long as they do not offend others. But still. It feels like in order to respect the event you need to dive in. You have to engage with your own desires and fears to really be a part of it. Also, I feel that in the field of contemporary performance, sex appears mostly in a banal light, at least according to my experience. It works, and is maybe also used, as a provocation. Fuck on stage and you’ll get attention. That motivation is notably absent here.

Towards the end of the evening it is clear: Dionysus has risen. I moan, they moan, we moan, as the chorus for his glory. And nobody is talking politics.

 

June 1968
Dionysus in 69, Performance Garage, NYC

The film ends with a parade where Dionysus is carried out like a king. He announces that he is running for president and he will start his term the following year. Hence the title of the play. As it happened, the president elect in the end was Richard Nixon.