Are You Guilty?

TOB Group presents a new show exploring the famous ‘bystander effect’, the social psychology theory that people are less likely to help someone in need if there are other people present. The show fuses together hip-hop, theatre and dance to ask timely questions about the nature of empathy and our appetite for coming to the aid of others. Using amazing dance moves it explores the fine line between a perpetrator and a victim.

Performed alongside Are you Guilty is Barcode, a bold new work about mass consumerism, including the post-lockdown phenomenon of ‘revenge consumption’. Using a collection of paper boxes as props, the work questions our need to acquire goods and the value we attach to products and even people. Barcodes become a metaphor for convenience and the belief that everything has a price. Choreographed by Min Kim, the show also explores the concepts of ‘conspicuous consumption’ (buying to show one’s wealth) and ‘revenge consumption’ (overindulging in retail therapy when restrictions are lifted), along with the power of other people to influence our spending habits.

TOB Group (Think Outside the Box) is a young and energetic Korean contemporary dance company, comprised of contemporary dancers who together studied at the Korea National University of Arts. Since their inception, the group has specialised in creating genre-defying physical works exploring cross-cultural social phenomena. By crafting a freely expressive physical language, the company seeks to step outside the traditional limits of contemporary dance and discover a new way of connecting with audiences.