MR AND MRS CLARK – SMASH IT UP
Chapter Arts Centre, Cardiff
Wed 17 Feb-Sat 27 Feb
Mr and Mrs Clark are at it again. The geniuses who brought us The Medicine Show and the outstanding forth-wall breaker, Nine, are back with a new show. Smash It Up began as a series of public space performances, which saw the Clarks collaborating with Newport art activists Bosch, and it’s from those performances the theatre show emerged. Created as a direct response to the destruction of the Chartist Mural in Newport (to make way for a new shopping centre) the show concerns the issue of art versus commercialism. Mr and Mrs Clark are renowned for their passion for art and unrestricted creative expression and are not afraid to speak – or act – out.
The duo are consummate professionals, their performances are faultless, bizarre, often ridiculous, sometimes raunchy and always entertaining. Shows often combine song, dance, mime and a dark humour and certainly give audiences much to talk about after the curtain drops. Smash It Up is an exhibition, a performance lecture, a dance theatre show with documentary and short films; it is a challenging and uncomfortable demand for equality, for hope and for greater creative freedom, and was short-listed for the Amnesty Freedom of Expression Award at the Edinburgh Fringe. The Clarks ooze originality and Smash It Up will no doubt join their other shows on the list of contemporary masterpieces.
Tickets: £7-£12. Info: 029 2030 4400 / www.chapter.org
words LYNDA NASH
