Yasmeen Godder and the Bloody Bench Players presents: "Strawberry Cream and Gunpowder"

A dreamy world is conjured up by the deconstruction of local war images into an alternate reality, one with the same aesthetics but with new and personal connotation. The desire for this project came with the need to bring to life, resuscitate, the grotesque and disturbing images which have become inseparable from our lives, and in their repetitive nature, have brought us to numbness. A look at local imagery as local mythology, through its flat cartoon-like representation, the work attempts at bringing back these images into a three-dimensional world.

A dreamy world is conjured up by the deconstruction of local war images into an alternate reality, one with the same aesthetics but with new and personal connotation. The desire for this project came with the need to bring to life, resuscitate, the grotesque and disturbing images which have become inseparable from our lives, and in their repetitive nature, have brought us to numbness. A look at local imagery as local mythology, through its flat cartoon-like representation, the work attempts at bringing back these images into a three-dimensional world.

"Regarding the Pain of Others- Yasmeen Godder deals with the wonders of the body, which encompasses a spectrum of emotions.  Every touch brings forth a sensation, laughter, sigh or scream.  In this work, the choking scream over a lifeless body is the main image, from which Godder goes on an exhaustive and exceptional journey, which examines what exists within that familiar newspaper photograph, so known to us, of a shot body which turns a human to a corpse, about which Susan Sontag wrote in her "Regarding the Pain of Others", in which there is no alternative to looking at it, due to a mixed emotion of disgust and fascination. Like in children's game, one dancer stands holding an imaginative gun, and another dancer fall on the floor.  But Godder's living dead man stands again, laughs and loves and suffers and dies, and women cry over him in an Esperanto of lamentation."
[Gabi Eldor, Ha'Ir  January 2005]

"There are not many Israeli artists, neither in dancer nor in other disciplines, whose work raises so much anticipation, curiosity and suspense.  In her unique way, Godder not only rose up to the expectations, but succeeded again to surprise, stir and challenge what is known and familiar…..Godder forces Israeli dance to redefine the borders of sensitivity, themes and even the make do with strawberry cream.  The smell of gunpowder will accompany the creative performers and us, the audience, wherever we go.  "
[Gilad Reich, Globs, November 2004]

"The understanding that the piece is a personal-political work, in its most immediate and instinctive level, contributes to the perfect timing of its coming about on the landscape of current activity here "
[Jacque Farber, Kol Ha'Ir  November 2004]

"It is 22:00, a solemn hour with Strawberry Cream and Gunpowder,  a piece in which the 8 dancers, coming from Tel Aviv, Jaffa and Jerusalem,  incarnate war better than any televised journal.  This is violence in its pure state,  in the bodies, the gestures,  the books.  The choreography is with unheard-of power.  It is bewildering for performers and public alike.  The dancers hassle each other like in the border.  Silent scream a-la Munch,  women in Pieta.  On stage like on earth,  the executioners become victims and vice-versa and there is one winner:  black despair."
[Midi Libre,  France June 18, 2005]

Light Equipment

11 X ETC 750 36 Degrees
4 X ETC 750 50 Degrees
4 X 2000W P.C.
8 X PAR – CAN 64 1000W. Medium Flood CP 62.
16 X Fresnel 1000W. with Barn doors.
1 X Four Light 250W 220Volt.
5 X 1000W P.C. With Open doors.
8 X 2000W. Zoom Profiles Front Of House.
8 X Floor Stands high 120cm. (for 8 x Par-Cans)

5 x fluorescents tube 105watt. Length 240cm. Daylight. 
The Company needs wooden/metal white boxes (painted from inside and outside) in a size of 250cm to mask the florescent tubes. (Sketches with measurement and shape will be sent in due course with the light plot).
These lights and boxes are set up on the floor and are part of the set. The are covered with gel color Lee/Rosco # 200. Please prepare 2 pieces of  7.50 m long  by 0.50 m wide

GEL COLORS
All colors Lee/Rosco.
Humburg frost # 114
# 200 (for the above mentioned fluorescents tubes)

Haze machine – DF50.

Sound Equipment

P.A:
3\4way stereo system for 400 people (E.A.W/ MAYER SOUND / J.B.L/CLAIR BROTHER).
Sub must be in the hall.
  2*1/3 octave e.q (klark or equivalent)
1\3 octave e.q (klark or equivalent) for monitor send.
Speaker coverage as required for venue.
Monitor:
1 monitor (bi-amp) with 15" woofer &2" twiter
1 Amp. Tress Elliot 2* speakers 12 inch, 120 watt.

FRONT OF HOUSE :
8 channel mixer console- with 2 aux sends:
1 AUX pre fader. –1 AUX post fader
(YAMAHA ,SOUNDCRAFT SERIES , MAIDAS ,CREST).
2 compressors (dbx/bss).
EFFECTS RACK:
Lexcicon - pcm70/tc m2000/ pcm 90.

YAMAHA- SPX 90/ or eqvivalent.
YAMAHA - SPX 990.

1 mic sm58
1 d.i

Set & Misc

12 meters wide X 10 meters deep,  with two downstage exists
Floor: black linoleum. On the black linoleum the Company sets 9 linoleum rolls which  we bring with us.
Back wall of the stage must be black.
Stage must have air-conditioning.

Duration:  80  minutes, no intermission.  7 Dancers and 1 live musician

Load in day

- Minimum set-up time is 8 hours. 
- 1 hour for rest before show time.
- 2 hours for dismantling.
Venue must provide three(3) stage technicians for set-up and dismantling.

O t h e r s

Please provide company with 7 large bottles of mineral water for each show.  In addition, please provide herbal tea for the performers an hour before the show.

For further technical details please contact:
Alon Choen                                         
E-mail: alonov1@bezeqint.net