Levin Ballroom was jam-packed last Tuesday night with students anxiously awaiting the start of the 16th annual Liquid Latex show. The Liquid Latex show is an extremely popular event that showcases groups of Brandeis students performing pieces on a variety of themes without any clothes on, covered only in latex body paint. The show this year was titled “Peace, Love and Latex.”

The show opened with an impressive piece titled “Batman,” choreographed and designed by Sam Laney ’16. The piece showcased many students painted to look like Batman characters. Throughout the piece, the characters acted out a fight between Batman (Ray Trott ’16)/Robin (Michael Maglio ’18) and four villains (Caleb Dafilou ’18, Jordan Machlin ’16, David Winitch ’19 and Laney). The performers used lots of amazing dancing to act out the fight, and Dafilou and Laney performed impressive acrobatics that made the crowd go wild.

The second piece, which was incredibly hilarious, was titled “They Might Be Science,” choreographed by Bess Alshvang ’16 and designed by Julia Doucett ’16, and featured performers painted to represent many different scientific disciplines, including physics, math, engineering, biology, chemistry, quantum mechanics, astronomy and computer science. Each performer acted out a small skit to a humorous song about their respective discipline. This piece was particularly upbeat and funny, definitely serving as one of the comic relief performances of the show.

The most impressive piece was the next one, titled “In My Head,” choreographed by Julie Joseph ’18 and designed by Sonja Unica ’18. Unlike many of the pieces, which attempted to appeal to the audience with “sexy” walks down the stage and other sensual moves, this piece encompassed many different mental illnesses and had much more serious undertones. There were five performers, each painted to represent a different mental disorder, including Anorexia, Obsessive Compulsive Disorder, Anxiety, Borderline Personality Disorder and Depression, and they performed intricate choreography that added to the representation of their respective disorders. There were also two clothed performers — Joseph and Emma Gutman ’18 — wearing simple clothing alongside the painted ones, which made the piece much more powerful,as it called attention to their choreography and the message they were portraying, as opposed to the naked bodies and painted designs.

A very crowd-pleasing piece was “Bad Bitches Get Money,” choreographed by Annie Schide ’16 and designed by Selena Livas ’16, in which a group of female performers each portrayed a popular female musician, such as Florence Welch, St. Vincent, Lady Gaga, Kesha, Ana Tijoux, Nicki Minaj, Rihanna and Beyonce. Each performer acted out her respective musician with tons of personality and sass, and they had the audience intensely cheering for them. It was amazing to see a group of women being so fierce and giving it their all on stage.

Another feminism-inspired piece that was extremely impressive and got lots of attention from the audience was titled “Artistas Feministas,” choreographed by Kiara Tringali ’17 and designed by Tringali and Rachel Dillon ’17. It showcased a group of girls each representing a female-centered art piece, such as “The Mona Lisa” Performers had an opportunity within the piece to walk down the stage and showcase their painted bodies, and each of them added spark and personality to the paintings they were representing. The designs for this piece were the most impressive of any of the pieces. Each performer’s body was extremely well-painted, with explosions of color and very detailed designs that very much assisted in bringing the artworks that the performers were representing to life.

The Liquid Latex show, “Peace, Love, and Latex,” did not fall short at all of impressing the Brandeis community. In addition to showcasing impressive choreography, amazing talent and very colorful and exotic designs, the show served as an outlet for body positivity. Seeing unclothed performers giving all their personality while dancing with nothing but latex paint on their bodies was very inspiring, and all the performers should be applauded for having such confidence in being a part of this amazing production.

— Editor’s note: Catherine Rosch ’16 is an editor for the Justice and helped paint dancers. Brooke Granovsky is a staff writer for the Justice and performed in the show.