Use my Body while it’s still Young – Premiere

How can one counteract the stereotype of an elderly person as eccentric or frightening? The elderly body has been robbed of its sensuality and degraded to something second rate that has fulfilled its function, according to Hege Haagenrud. Are we afraid of our own mortality, is that why we avoid the elderly body? In Use my body while it’s still young the choreographer seeks to redefine our obsession with the shiny and new, which finds expression in our cultivation of youth and individuals’ desire to remove any physical signs of aging.

Rebekka Karijords song “Use my Body while it’s still Young”, and the music video where Siv Ander dances, was the starting point for the title and idea of the production.

In the performance four legendary dancers participate, 65–79 years of age, former dancers in the Norwegian National Ballet, the Cullberg Ballet and Nederlands Dans Theater.

Hege Haagenrud works within the areas of both dance and theatre, with extensive use of video and text. Her productions are often staged in theatres abroad, and the work How to be alone was presented at Dance Umbrella in London in October 2014.