A white space suspended between the sacred and the urban. Four scenic moments reveal what is often hidden behind harshness: fragility, memory, pride, and a desire for redemption. Bodies that resist, that struggle, that remember. A solitary woman, a group moving like a pack, two men facing off in a choreography of restrained strength.

Created by choreographer Oona Doherty, this physical and dance piece, accompanied by music from David Holmes, offers a reflection on the identity of Belfast, a city marked by conflict and machismo. The work fuses contemporary dance with the rhythm of hip-hop, creating an atmosphere charged with tension and beauty. Every gesture, every movement, is a prayer, an open question.

The piece does not seek answers. It invokes. It names without words what remains hidden. It is testimony, homage, and protest. A contemporary ritual that crosses geographical borders to speak to us about what it means to resist, to transform, and perhaps, to find a way to peace.

Programme

Artists

OD Works

Company

Oona Doherty - OD Works

Conductor

Press quotes

“An intense evocation of the city: Hard to be Soft – A Belfast Prayer by Oona Doherty.”

Róisín O’Brien. Seeing Dance

“Attuned to human postures, choreographer Oona Doherty presents a work in four episodes: Hard to Be Soft – A Belfast Prayer. Set to music that blends Irish slang and sacred sounds, the dancers create sociological fragments in slow motion. Between wounded masculinities and virile femininities.”

Paris Art

“Oona Doherty confronts the toughest men of Belfast. Part of her Hard to be Soft – A Belfast Prayer is a big, rough embrace for all those fathers, sons and brothers.”

Michael Seaver. The Irish Times

“Aggression. Sensuality. Vulnerability. Hard to Be Soft is a danced prayer about —and for— the people of Belfast.”

John Preece. The Edinburgh Reporter

“Dance as physicality charged with meaning... a physical practice capable of recording and materializing social change. The potential of choreography as social resistance.”

Aoife McGrath

“What if we took these aspects of Belfast and raised them to a sacred place? An existential hymn? I want to create a dance-theatre work that abstracts the fragmented memories of my youth in Northern Ireland and transforms them into a bright neon prayer. Welcome to a white, radiant limbo.”

Oona Doherty