Nick Cave is a genius. I’m talking about the visual artist/sculptor who makes the Soundsuits, not Nick Cave the singer who has plenty of fans even if I’m not among them. What this Nick Cave does with day-glo colored hair in garishly beautiful combinations sewn into forms that use the human body to transcend the human body, well . . . just looking at them makes me feel like I dropped acid. What he does with backing, buttons, plastic ties, and bits of yarn makes me shake my head until my mind just gives in to a sense of delight and wonderment. He paints huge round canvases with sequins and beads, and comes up with work that seems as cosmic as a Jackson Pollack to me.
The performance by people wearing his Soundsuits was great fun, if a shade disappointing. The dancing was joyful and cool, but not exactly a revelation. The audience only got to see the softest, most normal-looking (most human) of the bodysuits in action, however. No fifteen foot bear costume made out of old sweaters. No ten foot cages holding sci-fi toys from the Fifties resting on someone’s shoulders. None of the giant hair pieces shaped like tongue depressor. We got the earthier, tribal, funky, easy-to-dance-in outfits, and not the Kozmik, What-Universe-Are-We-In? Soundsuits. Still, I don’t mean to complain. It was sensational. Fabulous. Eye-opening and mind-blowing. Plus, you could dance to it . . . in it (the craziest club-kid outfit EVER) . . . at least in your mind.
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