Swimming with my Mother @ Dance Base

Apart from creating dance theatre, CoisCéim are committed to widening participation in dance. In Swimming with my Mother, artistic director David Bolger gets his mother participating:  the sublimely composed life-guard and synchronised swimming teacher Madge. Now co-star of this gentle, intimate mother-son dance piece, she exudes calm and confidence, drawing the audience in to the atmosphere of competency and trust in which David learnt to swim. It’s really very soothing.

The movement is both carefully choreographed and full of care, allowing David’s professional training to complement rather than outshine Madge. Playful echoes of vaudeville and some cheeky multimedia interaction combine with thoughtful voiceovers, allowing the performance to tap lightly across a range of emotional registers - not only were heartstrings tugged, it also tapped into those darker, deeper urges to run off into the night and get myself some fish and chips.

The dynamics of the mother-son relationship are not just an end in themselves but open up a meditation on what it means to pass on a skill you love, or a joy in movement. A gentle, joyful, intergenerational gem.