This review has been taken from my NSDF blog, written for the Peter de Haan Charitable Trust.
The University of Manchester bring us at the NSDF the opening of the White House Institute, a stingingly observed piece of immersive theatre. Inspired by the work of La Clique's Ursula Martinez and Christopher Green, namely their 2008 Edinburgh hit Office Party, White House Institute is the gallery opening and unveiling of the newest work by radical ‘artist' Tracey Hutcheson. The audience are able to mill around with wine and nibbles discovering the great visual gags hidden in ‘art' they find around them. This is punctuated with short films and speeches from the gallery's curator. The audience is split off into different groups and given talks by one of the performers, this giving a real sense of privilege in the hearing of these more private asides; the sniping art critic whose description of Hutcheson's for sliding from exaltation to disgust a particular treat. Protests break-out and the feeling of the privileged witness appears again when you exit the show - the curator kidnapped in the back of a car. White House Institute is a craftily considered and meticulous post-modern farce reminding the audience more of TV like The Office or The Thick of It. Its satire is cleverly constructed and structure of the evening which allows the audience to move freely in the space whilst setting up lighting and sound conventions early on that prompt the audience's reaction keeps the performers in control. The thing that really stays with this performance is its observation and whilst some characters seemed under used, Hutcheson herself - though correct in her characterisation of the vague and pampered artist - could have done more, the audience goes away with the feeling that this could be happening at a regional gallery right now.
White House Institute: ****
Image courtesy of Traceyhutcheson.blogspot.
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