Some FRINGE WORLD shows are a high-octane experience, full of lights and costume changes, tricks and dips, all designed to make you whoop and cheer. But remember: some shows you’ll see this year are a tender love letter to the human experience and our place within it. Lemon is exceedingly the latter. And brilliantly so. 

A deep, contemplative work, Lemon is a dance piece that marries elegance, eloquence, absurdity and fruit to create a meditative space that is medicine for the soul. Interpretative and gestural, Lemon explores women’s sensuality with assuredness and aplomb. It does so in a way that draws you in, the entire venue a bouquet of lemon as the pulsing soundtrack creates a hypnotic rhythm. 

A definite highlight of this work is what can only be referred to as The Lemon Face Dance. This moment matches the comedic facial reactions of sucking lemons with jaunty movements, all rendered as a beautiful farce. The crescendo leads to a pile-on effect that at one moment can be seen as a commentary of social media, but is also suggestive of how the mouth winces around the sharp tang of acidic fruit. 

There is also a second breakaway stage to this work. Here, moments of love and intimacy, the domestic and familiar play out with raw intensity. The dances that appear here deepen the work in a profound way. This is the space where the key themes of this show – community and kinship – present themselves in a more tangible, unspoken manner. 

There are a lot of moments in Lemon that will speak to audience members in different ways. Such is the majesty of interpretative dance. And the five dancers of Lemon – Elsa Bignell, Lara Dorling, Montserrat Heras, Giorgia Schijf and presenter Amelia Sagrabb – maintain an endurance throughout the work that is truly beguiling to behold. 

If you are looking for a work that is pure, full of joy and maintains a brilliant pace, Lemon is the show for you. This is the perfect work to help cleanse your soul.