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Dancehouse is on Wurundjeri Country. We offer our respects to the Wurundjeri woi-wurrung people — and to all Aboriginal and Torres Strait Island people — who continue to dance on Country, and have done, for thousands of generations. Always was and always will be Aboriginal land.

Wet Hard Long

by Jenni Large

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Wet Hard Long (2023), by Jenni Large. Photo by Gregory Lorenzutti.
7pm, 4 — 13 July 2024
Sylvia Staehli Theatre

COZZIE LIVS TIX: $20
(all shows, 20 per night)

Fan: $45
Full:
 $35
Concession: $30
Members/Locals: $25
MobTix: $20
Companion Card: FREE

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Event Duration: 60 minutes

* Wet Hard Long by Jenni Large contains strobing, haze and loud noises

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— Bending innuendo and oozing feminine resilience a-top 8 inch heels.

Wet Hard Long exhibits the enduring femme body under scrutiny of a patriarchal society.

Edging the audience towards the promise of relief, two dancers undertake exacting physical feats. Their bodies contend with obstacles, objects and elements – each, more impossible than the last.

Extended from Jenni Large’s 2022 KCA audience prize-winning work (Wet Hard), Wet Hard Long is an epic display of grit, glamour, and glistening jaw-clenching stamina. A slippery endurance piece demanding perseverance from performers and viewers in a tribute to the strenuous expectations which femme bodies continue to overcome.

Subverting narratives around sex and power, performing perfection, and avoiding failure, Wet Hard Long provokes questions about identity, desire, ownership, consent and the holy and arduous qualities of the feminine.

“In over a decade of reviewing, this is the best dance performance I have ever seen.”★★★★Jessi Ryan, ArtsHub

“As they move around the stage, they appear to envelop one another in slow motion, disappearing in uncanny symmetries and mirror effects. They bend like Hans Bellmer dolls and create surreal heaps of fishnet calves, spikes and sparkles.” — ★★★★ Andrew Fuhrmann, The Age

Choreographer, Director & Performer: Jenni Large
Collaborating Performer: Amber McCartney
Composer: Anna Whitaker
Lighting Designer: Adelaide Harney
Costume Designer: Michelle Boyde
Sculptural Fabricator: Jemima Lucas
Dramaturg: Ashleigh Musk
Curator: P. Eldridge
Understudy: Nikki Tarling

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Jenni Large is based on palawa country in Lutruwita/Tasmania and works as a dancer, choreographer and teacher across so-called Australia. Driven by the personal, political and transformative forces of embodiment, Jenni’s practice incorporates dancing, performance/endurance art, objects and sculpture. Spell-bound by pop-culture aesthetics, Jenni endeavours to subvert relational narratives examining power dynamics and socio-political issues that impact women. Jenni has performed extensively across Australia and internationally with artists and companies including; Tasdance, Dancenorth, Legs On The Wall, GUTS Dance, SA Opera/Leigh Warren and Ashleigh Musk. Jenni’s recent choreographic works include; ‘Wet Hard’ – KCA People’s Choice Award, ‘Body Body Commodity’ – Mona Foma, ’S U C K E R’ – Sydney Dance Company’s New Breed, ‘Synthetic Seduction’ for SDC PPY and ‘Truth Beauty Suffering’ for Australasian Dance Collective. Recently Jenni was honoured to receive a Chloe Munro Fellowship and participate in Asia Link’s Singapore Arts Now exchange with Tasdance.

Amber McCartney is a Naarm/Melbourne-based dancer and choreographer. Her practice incorporates prosthetics, mask-making, film and practical special effects to create new augmented bodies. Amber has worked extensively with Chunky Move, Lucy Guerin Inc. and is a creative associate of Tasdance. Amber received a John Truscott Artists Award for her solo Tiny Infinite Deaths, performed in RISING 2023, originally commissioned by Lucy Guerin Inc and The Substation. In 2023 Amber premiered her solo Baby Girl, commissioned by Tasdance, for MONA FOMA. In 2022 she was honoured to receive a Chloe Munro Fellowship from Lucy Guerin Inc. She won a Green Room Award for Best Performer in Prue Lang’s Project F and was a finalist for Telstra Emerging Choreographer Award. Her film Tiny Passenger was screened in dance(lens), Dancehouse. In 2020 Amber was a recipient of Chunky Move’s Solitude 1 and created her film Softtrap for the 2021 Activators program.

Anna Whitaker is a multi award-winning Meanjin/Brisbane based sound designer and composer. She graduated from Queensland Conservatorium of Music with a Bachelor of Music Technology, and since has designed and composed for productions including MONA FOMA, Sydney Dance Company, Australasian Dance Company, The Farm, tasdance, Stompin’, Aha Ensemble, La Boite Theatre Company, Brisbane Festival, Bleach* Festival, HOTA Gold Coast, Festival 2018 and Vulcana Circus. Her vast background in classical music and technology-based sound art result in musical concoctions from the traditional and contemporary worlds. Anna received the 2020/2021 and 2019 Matilda Award for Best Sound Design for her work on Michael Smith’s ‘Cowboy’ and The Farm’s ‘Throttle’ respectively. Anna’s unique voice is also evident in her installation works which have exhibited at Bleach* Festival, HOTA, MetroArts and QPAC Museum. Anna has a strong interest in composition for contemporary dance, and making and collaborating with regional artists and communities.

Adelaide Harney, a Lighting Designer and Technician, illuminates Melbourne and Perth stages, contributing to Australian productions with her unique voice. With an unwavering commitment to collaboration, she carves her presence in the contemporary artistic scene. Adelaide’s recent achievements showcase her pursuit of new ideas. Notable among these are her Lighting Design contributions to “Wet Long Hard” by Jenni Large, her role as a Lighting Tour Technician for “Silence” by Karul and BlakDance displays her versatility in shaping visual narratives. Adelaide’s collaborative spirit shines in Sampa the Great’s New South Wales Gallery performance, blending Lighting Design with production essence. She served as an Lx Programmer for “Garabari” by Joel Bray Dance and provided Set and lighting design for “You’re so Brave” by Georgie Ivers. A proud Victorian College alumna, she mentors at the Western Australia Academy of Performing Arts, nurturing budding lighting talents. Adelaide’s journey is fuelled by a passion for the stage, challenging lighting conventions and inspiring innovation through collaboration. Her impact resonates not only in her work but also in the lives she influences as a mentor.

Jemima Lucas (she/her) is a multi-disciplinary artist living and working in Naarm, whose broad practice intersects conceptual and spatial modalities of research, contemporary sculpture, assemblage and performance. Her work penetrates and dilates discourses around relativity, autonomy and material/ immaterial bodies. Stretching notions of stability and connectivity. Jemima completed a Bachelor of Fine Arts at Monash University, before undertaking an Honours of Fine Art at VCA. Her work has been exhibited and published locally and internationally. With materials enacting the primary point of departure in her practice; she would like to acknowledge the First Nations people on the lands from which they are sourced. The gravity of which is felt when mixing sand into a cement, mixing scoria to invest, welding steel, pouring latex and casting aluminium. All are mined from unceded indigenous land. Respect is payed to elders past, present and emerging.

Michelle Boyde is a seasoned fashion and textiles-trained designer and director of independent agency, BOYDE. As a costume designer under her namesake agency, she has worked for prominent cultural institutions Mona, DarkLab, Chunky Move, Melbourne Fashion Festival, NGV, and Bakehouse Studios, while also supporting an array of independent dancers and performers. Additionally, Michelle serves as the current Artistic Director of Design Tasmania, a respected not-for-profit design hub known for its extensive Tasmanian wood collection and exhibitions. She curates the center’s annual Artistic Program, focusing on local industry partnerships and the advancement of women in design, contributing significantly to Tasmania’s renowned design sector.

P. Eldridge (she/her) is a writer, literary editor, dramaturg, founder of the radical trans anarchist zine SISSY ANARCHY, managing editor of Worms, and co-founder of The Compost Library, working between London and so- called Australia.

Ashleigh Musk (she/her) is a dancer, choreographer, dramaturg and community arts facilitator based in Mparntwe (Alice Springs) in so-called Australia. She is deeply captivated by imagining futures, with a sensitivity to landscape and relationships, both human and beyond. Ashleigh’s work often uses industrial materials which are activated in experimental ways, revealing complex relationships through handling of these junk-like objects with radical care and tenderness. Significant projects in 2024 include: developing ‘Chaos in Concert’ with Jenni Large and Anna Whitaker, touring ‘SUB’ and ‘Fertile Ground’ to national platforms across so-called Australia, being artist-in- residence at tMuseum and Art Gallery of the Northern Territory, collaborating on ‘Desert Hothouse’ and youth project ‘Alice Can Dance’ with GUTS Dance, creating multidisciplinary installation CRISÁLIDA with Ivan Trigo Miras for the Desert Festival (Mparntwe) and participating as a selected artist in ‘Conversations on Performance’ at Festival TransAmériques and at the International Choreographers Retreat with Montreal Danse (Canada).


Jenni would like to thank all collaborators involved for the tender honesty, immense dedication and boggling talent which they’ve generously and unquestionably poured into Wet Hard Long. Thank you to family and friends for the profound everyday support which is the foundation from which she is able to sustain resilient creative practice. And thank you to Dancehouse for unwavering commitment and kindness.

This project is supported by Dancehouse, Creative Australia and The Australian Cultural Fund through the Chloe Munro Fellowship. Wet Hard was commissioned for the 2022 Keir Choreographic Award with support from Dancehouse, The Keir Foundation, Creative Australia, and Carriageworks.

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