Striptease for the Noise-boys

Last night me and my two friends went to this dance show at Danses Hus ( the House of Dance, duh) here in Stockholm to see this show called Nightshade where stiptease, contemporary dance and performance art would meet.
The only thing I heard about it before going was something about stippers doing modern dance, and my reaction was for some reason "Yay Strippers!!!!". So, yeah, that's why I decided to go, and also because I didn't quite know what to think of the whole concept.

Well, the show was something like 7 different striptease numbers, all coreographed by different people. On stage was also a quartet called the Emanon Ensamble, who accompanied these numbers. Quite a few of the performances were basically women stripping to crazy avant-garde noise. (Old people kept leaving). Pretty artsy I guess, because sometimes their bodies would contort in ways not often seen in regular striptease.

I just couldn't help thinking that this was the perfect show for all the Noise Boys out there, finally some kick ass stripping to good music. It was super funny. I thought about how they should put up posters for this in all the little obscure record stores in the city. The Noise Boys would come, provided their girlfriends would let them.

Right when I was getting bored with seeing naked women, writhing on the floor and what not , they threw in a male stripper too. Yeah, just for the hell of it, it seemed because why was there just one? He did this annoying mime-strip in his tighty whities in front of a TV with just a male face watching him. Then he did the backwards, hey, I’m taking my clothes ON all sexy, instead of OFF-thing. Wow. He did end up naked, and he he had no pubes. I had never actually seen that before, so that was new. He kind of looked like a newly born, fully grown stripper guy. And yet again, it was confirmed that male strippers don't do much for us at all.

The problem with this show, is that it didn't make a distinct point. What did they want with this stripping vs. "real art"? There where questions, but no answers, and when you build an entire show around this topic, you need to make some kind of stand. I mean sure, it’s an intresting discussion, what makes naked performance –artists and actors Art, and inventive strippers not Art? The answer is, like in so many cases of course the context. So was this Art now? Ok sure, why the hell not, but just being art doesn’t automatically make it good.