‘Keep Sleeping, Beauty’ Is Turning One Of The Most Familiar Stories On Its Head
Image: Image: Metro Arts
Fairy tales might promise happily ever after, but acclaimed Queensland performance artist Leah Shelton is turning one of the most familiar stories on its head with her fierce new work, ‘Keep Sleeping, Beauty’.
Premiering at Metro Arts, the provocative new production sees Shelton reunite with Olivier Award-winning UK artist and director Ursula Martinez following the international success of ‘BATSHIT’.
This time, Shelton is taking aim at misogyny, consent, gendered violence and the disturbing emergence of online “sleep content” featuring unconscious and non-consenting women.
A contempoary take on a classic story
Using the story of ‘Sleeping Beauty’ as its starting point, the work interrogates the recurring image of the unconscious woman, something we’re very familiar with across many fairy tales, art and popular culture, and asks audiences what those representations say about power, ownership and consent.
“I am creating this work because I am angry and shocked by the explosion of ‘sleep content’ online, featuring women who have been drugged (and more) without their consent,” Shelton said.
“I’m angry at the imbalances of power. Angry about the vilification of women, angry about the casual sexism, angry about the implied ownership of women’s bodies and the heteronormativity that is so entrenched in the ways that we interact with each other.”
“And I want to create ways to have conversations about how we can change for the better.”
Despite its confronting subject matter, audiences can expect Shelton’s work to provide a combination of dark humour, satire, absurdity and high camp performance art.
Metro Arts CEO Kieran Swann described Shelton as “one of Queensland’s most fearless contemporary performance artists”, praising her ability to transform difficult questions into theatre that is “sharply satirical, darkly humorous, and deeply riveting”.
‘Keep Sleeping, Beauty’ shows at Metro Arts’ New Benner Theatre, in the West End, in November.
4-14 November
New Benner Theatre, Metro Arts, West End
metroarts.com.au
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