Victor and Edith

Victor and Edith have been together for too long. Playing games is the only way they know how to relate to each other. It is their excitement, their trick. But actually it becomes their trap. The day they try to be serious with each other they find out that they lack the words to express what is on their mind. It is too late, and the storm that starts to blow wipes out all the delicately constructed rules of the game.

Victor never came to understand skin. The elastic sensitivity and sensuality of skin. He could read a book but he never really managed to read a body. Edith, who always loved to be touched and lived by her skin, became untouchable.

Time does change and even stainless steel will start to erode. Some people will say that it is a matter of maintenance. That you have to keep your relationship clean and tidy, just as your household, just like your stainless pans and pots. Or did they use too much polisher to make their relation look bright and shiny. Anyway, they used it on the wrong side of the pot. While the outside looked brand new, the inside was already red-rusty and dangerously eroded. No pot to cook a decent meal in.

Victor and Edith came alive for the first time in the Blackbox-theatre in Oslo in 1991. Benno and Bibbi danced a short, partly improvised duet in which Benno read a page out of The Bleeding Heart of Marilyn French. This is where the names Victor and Edith have their origin. After this small performance Benno and Bibbi started to write each other letters as the characters of Victor and Edith, to create a personal history for and an insight in who Victor and Edith could be. In April 1994 Benno and Bibbi were invited to perform an improvised version of the piece Victor and Edith in a dancefestival in Göteborg. This performance gave them the skeleton for the piece they later made in Oslo.

 Their body language is juicy, parodistic and unique. The couple matches extremely well: she is open and female - he is difficult to get at, skinny and tall: a mental skeleton. of course he likes food. In the still hours of the night he finds his way to the fridge, while Edith is starving from what the eater can't provide. No hope is evoked by this role play. But without doubt it provokes - a spark that can light a debate.          (Göteborgposten)

With great artistry Benno Voorham entangles himself as Victor in a labyrinth of not allowed emotions.... Bibbi Winberg succeeds in a very sensitive manner to work out the tragic of the woman in this relation..... Both dancers developed in the staging of Victor and Edith a rarely seen body language, in which they create a closeness to each other, that is both touching and frightening. They never loose the emotional relationship to each other and without stopping they shift from approaching to rejection.           (Potsdamer Neueste Nachrichten)

.....they have found a performing art of their own, which is physical and present, provocativ and humoristic.... Voorham and Winberg have successfully preserved the freshness and spontanious character of play which is based on improvisation..... Benno Voorham's quality is one of dry humor and the quality of Bibbi Winberg is one of determination and energy.    (Helsingin Sanomat)

Idea, choreography and dance: Benno Voorham and Bibbi Winberg

Music: Morten Hagevik