An experiment in anonymous intimacy and fake belief, Not About Face questions the nature of the unspoken contracts between performer and audience, and accesses the supernatural and spiritual as a way to investigate how the yearning for belief can make people do many things. For this performance, audience members are robed in full-body shrouds and join a free-roaming and anonymous gathering in the performance space. We will come together. We will become anonymous. We will fake belief or believe in faking it.

Luke George‘s practice is occupied with the interplay between the embodied and conceptual. His work explores energy and presence in relation to how we perceive ourselves, each other and the world around us.

Created by Luke George in collaboration with Hilary Clark, Nick Roux, Benjamin Cisterne, and Martyn Coutts. Performed by Luke George and Hilary Clark. Producer: Alison Halit.

The creative development of Not About Face was supported by grants from the Victorian Government through Arts Victoria, the Australian Government through the Australia Council, its arts funding and advisory body, Arts House and the Besen Family Foundation. The work was developed in residencies in Melbourne at Arts House CultureLAB, Lucy Guerin Inc, West Space Gallery, Thousand Pound Bend and in New York at Abrons Arts Center. The Australian premiere of Not About Facewas funded by the Australia Council and presented at Dancehouse. The New York premiere is commissioned by the Chocolate Factory Theater. International touring of the work is supported by Arts Victoria and the Australia Council.

“Audience of Ghosts, Taking Orders” – Gia Kourlas, New York Times