A dark tale of desire, death and ... deadliness it involves whips, fire, and a dead horse…Betty Bruiser is The Carny, a dark ethereal ringmaster who has only the skeleton of his horse named Sorrow for company. As the strip progresses she conjures up ‘a murder of crows (did circle round)First one, then the others flapping blackly down’.The body that is revealed is far from the beautiful Body portrayed in conventional burlesque.
Betty has been described as 'The Grand Guignol of the Neo Burlesque and as '(Imagine the)...sordid love child of Mae West and Franko B' High praise indeed for this star gazing gutter dweller.
Liz Clarke is a live artist and performer works with themes surrounding the Body as site and object. She explores the boundaries, constraints and vulnerabilities of the Body in performance; merging a variety of performance forms including live art, theatre, and traditionally lowbrow genres such as vaudeville and schlock. Her work questions the audience/performer relationship, around the nature of the voyeuristic gaze, implication and involvement. Betty Bruiser is her burlesque hating Betty is a backroom brawler, flasher mac poseur, hardcore haus frau and part time ringmaster.
The series of work which includes The Carny explores ‘Beauty’s Dark Double’. The flipside of the Beauty aesthetic, what happens when the Sexualised Body and the Body as Other meet in performance?
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