Pianka Pärna / Paul Regan

Pianka Pärna with Leo Chapman, Nando Messias, Claudia Palazzo + Wet Mess

Set in a surreal landscape where the traditions and discipline of ballet meet Eastern European folklore and BDSM practices, Curtain Call’s grotesque ballet artists explore oppression, liberation, occupation and independence. Visceral, sensory and queer, the baby-hungry Baba Yaga collides with pointe shoes and fetish-inflected ballet objects, deconstructing classical beauty and calling out to something wilder and freer.

Referencing both Slavic mythology and contemporary body culture and modification, the visual language of Curtain Call asks what perfection conceals and what it reveals.

Paul Regan

What substance to emerge from. Older stronger branch of divinity. Checking floor level grounding for affirmation of: skin type, blood pressures and relative humility. Half-be / half-made... serenity signals over and above the time of year. The setting in motion of going through devotion, the engine gets heavier but easier to lift this time.

Recurring themes Paul Regan’s work pertain to faith, religion, ritual, cultural identity and misappropriation. In recent years, he has developed a live performance practice to expand on ideas of compulsive action through site-specific interventions and activism.