New forms of censorship lurking in unexpected corners of society: Interview with Dries Verhoeven

Dutch performance artist Dries Verhoeven triggered a big controversy with his latest project Wanna Play? Love in Times of Grindr, produced by the independent theatre production house Hebbel am Ufer (HAU) in Berlin. He set out to question the topics of intimacy and of the private and the public on the Internet via mobile applications designed for meet-ups and was faced with an outraged gay community, which stood up in defense of privacy and managed to pressure the producers to cancel the project after just a few days. In the light of current events and the “censorship” coming from unexpected corners of society, we sat down to discuss important topics in Verhoeven’s work.