The Aching
Samir Kennedy
Information
This performance is a double-bill.
See this show alongside Katy Baird’s Get Off by booking seperate Pay What You Can tickets for both performances on the same evening.
Time: 7pm
Tickets: Pay What You Can (Recommended Price £8)*
*all orders will be subject to a transaction fee of £2
Running Time: 1 hour (no interval)
Age Recommendation: 14+
This event takes place in person in our Members Library
Presented as part of Bloom 2024: a series of double-bills featuring performances developed with BAC
See this show alongside Katy Baird’s Get Off by booking seperate Pay What You Can tickets for both performances on the same evening.
The Aching is an exploration of the temporality of grief.
Using folk songs from Great Britain, Ireland, and the United States, The Aching is a song cycle, gently lulling audiences into a fever dream.
Gentle yet brutal, it speaks to the seemingly eternal nature of the human capacity to experience suffering, while simultaneously transforming this suffering into creative expressions that complexify, and, in turn, transcend certain suffering.
The Aching is a gestural experiment.
Death as an archetypal study.
Grief as a melody.
Misery as a choreographic object.
The Aching will be followed by 30-minute film Reunion.
Reunion is a new video work made in collaboration by Samir Kennedy and artist Jame St Findlay. Shot over 7 days and nights in a former Ursuline Convent in Montpellier, the film explores death and misery through some of the more absurd, horrific and mundane manifestations.
Samir Kennedy is a British/Algerian dance, performance and sound artist based between the UK and France. He makes interdisciplinary works across video, sound, choreography and performance which centre the body as a site from which to perform notions of class, race, otherness, queerness and abjection using archetypal figures (such as the devil, the zombie, the clown) as vehicles from the collective consciousness which drive complex readings.
Credits
Creation and performance Samir Kennedy
Sound Samir Kennedy
Dramaturgy Simon Vincenzi
Supported by Battersea Arts Centre, ICI-CNN Centre Chorégraphique National de Montpellier, Tanzhaus Zürich, Wainsgate Dances, and Arts Council England.
Special thanks to Mayrto Katsiki, Katerina Azndreou, Sarah Manente, Ghyslaine Gau, Simon Vincenzi and Anne Kerzerho.
Access
PRE EVENT INFORMATION
This event takes place in person in our Members Library. This space is on the first floor, with step-free access via a lift.
If you have booked a ticket you will receive an email from us before your performance detailing important information about your visit.
PERSONAL ASSISTANT/COMPANION TICKETS
If you require the assistance of a friend or helper to attend, we can make a free ticket available for your companion. You can book access companion tickets online or contact the Box Office to book by emailing access@bac.org.uk.
To book a free access companion online:
- log in to your account here
- go to ‘Other preferences’ and tick ‘I require a personal assistant/companion’.
- Choose the performance, date and seats you would like and if you add at least 2 tickets to your basket, then one of these will automatically become free.
PERFORMANCE INFORMATION
Content
- Flashing lights
- Moment of complete darkness
- Loud sounds
- Contains themes of suicide
This performance will be Relaxed. We invite you to make yourself comfortable and move around if you need to and if you need to leave the performance at any point you will be allowed to return to the space when you feel ready.
We want our shows to be as accessible to as many people as possible.
We offer tickets to most shows on a Pay What You Can basis throughout the year.
Tickets for performances in 2025 start at £9.50, and we have recommended pricing to help you choose a price that works for you.
We know that ticket price is a huge barrier for some. If you can afford to pay the recommended price or more, choosing to do so supports those that can’t. It makes it possible for us to continue to offer Pay What You Can and welcome those who otherwise wouldn’t be able to attend.
