Recent works & Letter of support:
1.Cyst-er Act
Image by Holly Revell
Her material is raw and her relay of it feels vital and clandestine.
Exuent
Farcically serious, the work considers very real questions about women's health and how to integrate mainstream science with holistic medicine.
Total Theatre
Hoffmann's irreverent humour works well as a juxtaposition to the pain, shame and embarrassment that women still are expected to put up with.
The Stage
A messy, musical ritual - Madame Ovary meets The Devils - probing into reproductive mishaps and monstrosities.
What is it like to have your fallopian tube hacked off? Or to give birth to a 10lb cyst baby? The realm of the womb can be complex and bloody awesome…
Cyst-er Act is a new work written about Cath’s personal experience of having an ovary removed due to a large cyst that took over her entire stomach, and the discoveries of other women's womb difficulties. It uncovers lost knowledge about women's bodies and how these interior things occur through ovary blues, punk, death metal and some gospel numbers thrown in.
Joined on stage by her 'Poly-Cysters', Sarahjane Grimshaw and Amanda Radix, expect songs, slime, speculums and stripteasing nuns – Welcome to the wonders of the womb.
Originally shown at Ovalhouse and the Southbank centre. Supported by Arts Council England, Metal and Ovalhouse.
Creative team
Concept, writing and performance Catherine Hoffmann
Performers Sarah Jane Grimshaw and Amanda Radix
Direction and dramaturgy of initial R+D phase Jan Van den Bosch Witch doctor Tom Marshman
Choreographic assistance Florence Peake
Outside eyes Louise Mothersole, Madeleine Hodge
Lighting Designer Marty Langthorne
Costume Designer of habits and wimples Jack Goode
Producer Laura Sweeney
Engagement Producer Siobhan McGrath
Photography Holly Revell and Manuel Vason
DATES:
Feb 2020
13-25th August 2019
Edinburgh Fringe Fest
Summerhall
Wednesday 17th April 2019
Colchester Arts Centre
Wednesday 10th April 2019
Norwich Arts Centre
Wednesday 3rd April 2019
Artsadmin London
Saturday 16th March 2019
POW! Festival
Turner Contemporary Margate
Sunday 10th March 2019
Quarterhouse Folkestone
Thursday 9th Sep 2018
The Space in Between, Unlimited festival
Southbank centre
7-9th June 2018
Ovalhouse Theatre
Jan 28, 29 2022
Gender Medicine festival
Kampnagel, Hamburg
2. Women Working Class
Lead artist and organisational support for the resource website Women Working Class
History
Desperate to connect with other Working Class Artists in a room, Fox Irving came up with the idea of a ‘working class working group’. Meeting with artists Kelly Green and Catherine Hoffmann, conversations identified that there wasn’t really a space for working class women artists or producers to come together.
The idea is not for a group to come together to talk about class, but to imagine/practice ways for art spaces to better serve class diverse artists doing ground breaking, system changing work; discuss how issues of class influence what we make; and explore what our relationships are to just being and surviving in the art world and how it can liberate us to do the radical.
The Live Art Development Agency offered their resource room for women working class gatherings to meet and Fox applied for a project grant from the Arts Council – In December 2019, an open call was put out for the founding members of the group. It was at our first gathering of the Women Working Class Group that we started to create resources for working class artists and producers originally meant as a zine but due to the pandemic it moved online. Could we adapt it to survive the pandemic and the crisis within the arts? The founding group is now coming out the other side of the pandemic and have been busy making resources, provocations, podcasts and art for : www.womenworkingclass.com
Supported by Arts council England, Heart of Glass and Live Art development Agency
3.Free lunch with the StenchWench
‘A cross between performance art, stand-up, a gig and a call to arms.
A humorous and truly compelling performance.’
Desperate Optimists
‘Catherine Hoffmann's StenchWench is a labour of love and hits a home run for the proletariat! If you like your shows raw, real and dipping with beauty, go see this one. It will not disappoint.’
Stacy Makishi
‘At once funny, touching and full of sadness, StenchWench focuses on a harsh hidden upbringing in the UK, marked out by class and abject poverty. Cath takes us on a journey through some very personal experiences in her childhood struggle for survival and the lengths society makes us go to appear ‘normal’.’
Gill Lloyd, Co-Director Artsadmin
A solo show exploring the personal and shared experiences of growing up as one of the ‘feral underclass’ in relation to today’s ‘Austerity Britain’. Fleas, cheap clothes, thrifty bread, cold baths, and debauched disadvantaged dancing will be unleashed as I chart the drive for survival and fitting in.
Stories and songs about how to get by will be shared whilst I attempt to overcome the shame of bareness and celebrate our spirit of community and hope.
A one woman flea circus doled up with faded glory, austerity pants, mouldy scones and hot chocolate.
Supported by The Arts council England, The Bike shed, Kingsley hall
A development following on from showings at Domestic Festival, Salford, presented by Word of Warning and The Guinness Partnership.
Toured UK Theatres and art centres throughout 2017/18 including:
Toynbee studios, Artsadmin
Beyond Bloodlines festival at The Cockpit
MAC, Birmingham
'Common' festival at CPT,
Norwich arts centre,
Colchester arts centre
Buzzcut, Glasgow
Stephen Lawrence gallery, Greenwich
Live Art Bistro, Leeds
Wardrobe Theatre, Bristol
Creative Team
Written and performed by Catherine Hoffmann
Producer: Laura Sweeney
Lighting Designer: Marty Langthorne
Press and PR: Anna Goodman, Abstrakt PR
Production: Malachy Orozco
Outside eyes: Florence Peake, Dickie Beau, Katy Baird
Photography: Lesley Ewen, Richard Davenport
Filmed by Tim Newton
Interviews and articles about Free Lunch with the StenchWench:
For Hypatia journal for feminist philosophy 'Gender and the politics of shame'
By Dr. Alexandra Kokoli, Toward a Synaesthetics of Poverty and Shame in Catherine Hoffmann's Performance.
Interview in The Guardian with Nell Frizell:
Article written for Exeunt - 'Where are the voices exploring working class experiences in the arts?'
Blog written for Big Issue North:
Interview with Kelly green for LADA's study room guide
-Let's get Classy - Live art, class and cultural privilege
Ten tips on being feckless and poor for LADA toolkit series - Ways of getting classy
4. Whatever Happened to The Glory Days?
As part of Love Letters to a (post) Europe event and book 2018
Toynbee studios, London,
Edge Hill Arts centre, Ormskirk,
Performance Space, Folkestone
GISWIL Performance Art festival , Switzerland, 2019
Making an Exit festival, Chisenhale, London, 2019
Bios, Athens, October 2016
Book published by LADA and Unbound.
With texts from Whatever happened to the Glory days:
A curated event of short works performed in the context of a rapidly changing Europe.
Other Participating artists:
Friday 2 October
Kate Adams (UK), Demosthenes Agrafiotis (GR), Brian Catling & David Tolley (UK), Tim Etchells (UK), Alec Finlay (UK) performance: Haris Attonis, Wendy Houstoun (UK), Brian Lobel (USA/UK), Georgios Makkas (GR), Kira O’Reilly (IR/UK) performance: Vassiliki Dimou, Erica Scourti (UK/GR), Maria Sideri (GR), Jungmin Song (KR), Yoko Tawada (JP/DE)
Saturday 3 October
cris cheek (UK), Robin Deacon (UK/USA), Matthew Goulish (USA) performance: Evdokia Delipetrou, Guy Harries (UK), Steven C Harvey (UK), Georgios Makkas (GR), Mikhail Karikis (GR/UK), Claire MacDonald (UK), performance: Evangeli Fili, Ivana Müller (HR/FR), Mariela Nestora (GR) and group, Florence Peake (UK), Anna Sherbany (UK), Nikki Tomlinson (UK)
Levelled at this crisis of social imagination, economic dogmatism and neoliberal tyranny is imagination, empathy, sensuality, presence, being together, singular witnessing, living manifestos, stories, acts of friendship, fellowship, solidarity, refusals of order, nonsense, gifting, calls from and to the wilderness, rants, tough love, seductions, messages in brokenness, adoration, utopias and post-utopias, songs from the margins, addressing the now.
Concept and curation: Lisa Alexander
Production: Lisa Alexander & BIOS
Letter of support
