Urban Playground

For 2 days only (sniff...) the centre of town was turned into an urban jungle as the Schechter/2 FaCeD dancer-monkeys swung, slid and somersaulted around the temporary framework - and making it somehow look so easy; as if they were all born swinging from scaffolding.

Sooo much fun.

One thing that's really hit me during the IDFB is that there's a massive sense of play in dance. It's about going into a space and thinking 'Right, how can I play with this?' And for dancers and audience alike, in this incidence, Victoria Square became a spectacular playground. For me, this is so what it's all about. Dance that isn't confined to your 20 x 20 stage, but bursts out from the theatres with that native, invincible energy into the streets, into the normal, mundane places of life, transforming each little grey urban contour into a possibility for a bit of a twirl.

If this is what public art is, then I'm sold. So much better than some half-arsed statue that no-one really notices (apart from the pigeons and their s**t).

Of course the only problem with truly public art is that there are no neatly arranged sight-lines and I did spend quite a large percentage of the time staring at the back of people's heads; which weren't nearly so entertaining. I did, at one point, ask a nice kind-looking dad who had a toddler perched on his shoulders if he had room for another one, but he just laughed nervously and backed away, before I started to clamber up his trouser-leg. Well hey, all the world's a climbing frame isn't it? ...