Unwoman - the third act, presented by The Rabble, with Yumi Umiumare 

 

It is November, 2019 at The Substation in Newport, Melbourne. The seats are hard black plastic and the performance is so sold out I can feel on both sides where my shoulders end and someone else’s begins. My friend is on my right and she’s never seen devised theatre before, on my left is a stranger. With no interval, by the third act I have shared something very intimate with them both. Everyone is squirming and quietly apologising to their neighbours for the kicks and nudges that signify extreme discomfort but no one dares leave the performance early. Pale grey cement blocks stacked one, two, or three high outline a large circle, defining the space as an arena, a coliseum for the labours of birth. Afterwards when I talk about it with my friend the space is both a well, the bottom of a life-giving pit; and a hearth, a place of comfort. 

 

Yumi Umiumare is sitting on a chair, heavily pregnant and wearing a simple black dress. A rope is extending from the small of her back to the heavens of the theatre. Over the next 45 minutes that rope will both chain her and support her, the symbol of her binding and a crutch to lean on. She is in labour; hard, heavy, mythical. She crawls and writhes, grunts, moans, wails, and pushes. At the first crescendo she howls at us, pulling on the rope and borrowing its strength until finally she births a stone. Then she births another, and another. Six stones, all similar size and colour and similar jagged-edged shape, lay motionless on the floor where she leaves them. She pulls a camera close and stares into it, her projected face dominates the space as her wails and staccato breaths are transformed into measured laughter and she stares down her opponent. As I stare back, I imagine that she has always been there, tied to the cold earth, forced to birth its progeny. 

 

This self-contained third act of Unwoman’s pregnancy trifecta examines the issue of bodily autonomy and control. The rope binding Umiumare to the space signifies an umbilical tie as an object of giving and sustenance and as a controlled restriction of movement and physical expression. The space is first defined by the cement blocks, then by her range of movement; should she escape the rope, the blocks serve as another obstacle, beyond them the physical space of theatre is a barrier to the limits of the performance, beyond that again is the space we occupy – a rigid societal paradigm pushing against a post-structuralist ideal of ultimate freedom of expression. Unwoman separates the experiences of birth and motherhood through the punishing portrayal of an endless, fruitless labour. It reduces the woman down to its barest functionality and use. 

The context, as the finale to a piece pointedly titled “Unwoman”, however, suggests an opposition to traditionality, drawing into question the functionality and essentialism that the action presents. The prefix ‘un-’ can mean different things. It can mean ‘not’; e.g. unattractive (adj.), not attractive or not ‘woman’. It can mean opposite action; e.g. unkill (verb), to bring back to life or to reverse ‘woman’. It can also mean release; e.g. untangle (verb), to be free from womanhood. A title inspires an expectation in a spectator. It is usually the first contact with a work and forms the foundation of the primary response that an audience member will have. It is at this junction of action and expectation that meaning is made by us. Separate meanings for separate spectators, dependent on their lived experience. In the case of Unwoman, the relativity of the audience to the work is dependent on their relationship to their own body as having a body that has experienced birth, having one with the ability to experience birth, and having a body that will never be able to give birth. 

 

Unwoman was outstanding in its ability to transport the audience and harvests a rich emotional and physiological experience. It was aesthetically and emotionally confronting, and the experience extended in both chronological directions beyond sitting in the theatre. As someone interested in The Rabble’s work I was exposed to their process through email and social media, callouts for pregnant performers, and the evolution of their marketing campaign. All of which were successful in seeding a positive and affective experience. After the performance I continued to think and talk about it and my perception of pregnancy and the breadth of my own philosophising surrounding the body and gender and feminism continues to be shaped by what I witnessed. It is a work that made me consciously aware of my positionality as the owner of the function of ‘woman’ that they represent. 

 

In a truly phenomenal way, Umiumare’s performance inhabited my body as a spectator. Her discomfort was mine; her straining voice was my voice straining against the active silence, her breath got caught in my lungs, and when she moved, I felt compelled to shift in my seat. 

 

Unwoman challenged me as a ‘woman’; it transported me, squeezed me into an uncomfortable space, and pushed me back out. Just as the body presented by Umiumare can’t escape her punishment, I can’t escape from knowing that this was planned, that there is a performance text being followed, that multiple artists of varying identifications were involved in the formation of my experience, that what she is doing on stage is considered “material” and “content”. The question I leave with is this: Have I been ‘Unwomaned’?