26 February 2019
Newsdesk
Hey Baby! Following her hit success at Edinburgh Fringe 2018, award-winning performance artist Katy Dye now takes Baby Face on an exciting UK Tour. Baby Face - winner of The Autopsy Award and Lustrum Award 2018 - is a daring look into the paradox of living in a society that continues to infantilise adult women.
Welcome to a world of knee socks, bunches, lollipops, bubblegum and models adopting the childlike expressions of six-year-old girls. Paedophilia is condemned yet fetishised images of women as prepubescent girls are everywhere. In this brave and outlandish performance, Katy Dye questions if innocence is truly as sexy as we’re told.
[a] pointed examination of the way that women are infantilised and how they sometimes collude... Baby Face is provocative stuff...big on impact (Lyn Gardner, The Independent).
Here, the audience enter a strange world, where a grown woman transforms from adult, to teenager, to toddler, to baby. She dresses in a school uniform and performs Britney’s iconic routine. She squeezes herself into a clingy top printed with cartoons - meant for a child or a grown woman? In a pristine white set, using minimal costumes and a baby’s high chair, she navigates the uncomfortable line between wanting to be cared for and being infantilised. With a soundtrack of bubblegum pop and drone rock, and a cloud of talcum powder and haze, strange mixed messages hang in the air. Baby Face is an exposure of our contradictory society when it comes to women’s bodies and how they are treated.
Katy Dye comments, We live in a world where we are frequently exposed to images of women who are made to look like little girls. As an adult who has physical childlike attributes, I was interested in becoming the infantilised images I have seen throughout my life, to find out the physical and emotional impact of this. The show blends performance art, dance and visually striking performance to ask difficult questions about the moral conscience of society.
The production is supported by Arts Council England and the Hunter Foundation.
Running time 50 minutes
Box Office Tickets are available from individual theatre box offices.
Ages 16+, talcum powder used in show (allergy warning)
Artist/Performer Katy Dye
Producer Jack Stancliffe
Sound Designer Zac Scott
Lighting Design Michaella Fee Rossi
Video/photography Daniel Hughes
Performance Dates
7th – 9th February Tron Theatre, Glasgow
63 Trongate, Glasgow G1 5HB
28th February Theatre Deli, Sheffield
202 Eyre Street, Sheffield S1 4QZ
6th March Lawrence Batley Theatre, Huddersfield
Queen Street, Huddersfield HD1 2SP
8th – 9th March Brighton Dome
Church Street, Brighton BN1 1UE
20th March The Lowry, Manchester
Pier 8, The Quays, Salford M50 3AZ
23rd March Harlow Playhouse Essex
Playhouse Square, Harlow CM20 1LS
