Finnish Exposure The Days

The Days invites you to share an encounter with two exceptional Finnish performers, Maria Nurmela and Ville Oinonen. Constructed from a singular physical concept sustained throughout the work, The Days engenders a world of ever shifting negotiations, complex feelings and comic disconnection. Caught in an impossible loop of absurd and heartfelt exchanges, the performers journey takes the form of a lifetime shared in this compelling performance about care, resilience and the desire for connection.

Conceived as more than a simple performance, The Days seeks to engage with local communities and diffuse the hierarchies between different bodies as performers and movers. On stage, Nurmela and Oinonen are joined by two participants, a man and a woman aged over 65-years, who are selected from a workshop held for interested elderly people in each city of performance.

There is a two-way exchange: professional performers Nurmela and Oinonen are transmitting their trained bodily knowledge for the workshop participants and the guest performers picked from the group, but the lived experience of the amateur participants enrichens and deepens the performance itself. The Days shows that contemporary dance and performance belong to every body and every age.

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The Days project started 2017 on the initiative of Maria Nurmela and Ville Oinonen, who as freelance dance artists invited English choreographer and designer, Theo Clinkard to create a work they could perform together. Clinkard's previous experience of co-directing a dancer-run commissioning duet company Probe made him an especially appropriate choice to launch this new project.