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| The curious incident of the dog, the Hanover ballet and the everyday sexism we face as female arts critics | The curious incident of the dog, the Hanover ballet and the everyday sexism we face as female arts critics |
| (12 days later) | |
| There are more women in cultural criticism now in Germany and Britain, but we also face more aggression. Is this progress? | There are more women in cultural criticism now in Germany and Britain, but we also face more aggression. Is this progress? |
| Remember the international outrage over a lurid incident involving a female dance critic, a male choreographer and a deposit of his pet dachshund’s excrement? In February 2023 the German choreographer Marco Goecke cornered Wiebke Hüster in the foyer of the Hanover State Opera during the interval of a show. Goecke, who was then artistic director of the venue, brought out a bag of dog poo from his pocket and pushed it into the journalist’s face. The reason? Hüster had written a negative review of his Netherlands-based show, In the Dutch Mountains, which had appeared in the newspaper Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung (Faz) on the night of his hundekot attack. | Remember the international outrage over a lurid incident involving a female dance critic, a male choreographer and a deposit of his pet dachshund’s excrement? In February 2023 the German choreographer Marco Goecke cornered Wiebke Hüster in the foyer of the Hanover State Opera during the interval of a show. Goecke, who was then artistic director of the venue, brought out a bag of dog poo from his pocket and pushed it into the journalist’s face. The reason? Hüster had written a negative review of his Netherlands-based show, In the Dutch Mountains, which had appeared in the newspaper Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung (Faz) on the night of his hundekot attack. |
| The incident sparked column inches of conversation in Germany on critical culture, with a ripple effect further afield: in the Netherlands, theatre critics condemned it as an act of violence against freedom of expression; in the US, the American Theatre Critics Association did the same, with a blaze of accompanying newspaper headlines across Europe. | The incident sparked column inches of conversation in Germany on critical culture, with a ripple effect further afield: in the Netherlands, theatre critics condemned it as an act of violence against freedom of expression; in the US, the American Theatre Critics Association did the same, with a blaze of accompanying newspaper headlines across Europe. |
| Goecke lost his job and became a professional persona non grata. Good, I thought, as a critic who has been approached by some angry men myself in theatre auditoriums, though never with this level of repellently visceral aggression. The reaction was indubitable proof of the culture industry’s zero tolerance towards assault in Germany, right? Especially in a case involving a man attacking a woman in this publicly shaming way. | Goecke lost his job and became a professional persona non grata. Good, I thought, as a critic who has been approached by some angry men myself in theatre auditoriums, though never with this level of repellently visceral aggression. The reaction was indubitable proof of the culture industry’s zero tolerance towards assault in Germany, right? Especially in a case involving a man attacking a woman in this publicly shaming way. |
| Wrong. In May 2024, Goecke was appointed ballet director at Theater Basel for the upcoming 2025-26 season. He had remained in the doghouse for just over a year despite all the hand-wringing in Germany. What does this say about the position of critics in general, and female reviewers in particular, given the misogynistic undertones in Goecke’s act, which seemed like a calculated aim to humiliate and degrade? | Wrong. In May 2024, Goecke was appointed ballet director at Theater Basel for the upcoming 2025-26 season. He had remained in the doghouse for just over a year despite all the hand-wringing in Germany. What does this say about the position of critics in general, and female reviewers in particular, given the misogynistic undertones in Goecke’s act, which seemed like a calculated aim to humiliate and degrade? |
| Reflecting on the episode in a new BBC Radio 4 documentary about the state of culture criticism in our fast-changing world of AI, algorithms and influencer-critics, Hüster spoke to me about her lack of surprise at Goecke’s rehabilitation. She had always assumed he would find work again. From a highly experienced critic who has been on the scene for several decades, what does that say about gender dynamics in the arts? Shockingly, in the moments after the attack she felt grateful it had not been worse, despite her sense of violation. “I thought: ‘It’s bad – but it’s not a knife in your ribs,’” she said, and went on to describe the hate burning off her attacker, as if he bore an “absolute sincere wish to do me real harm”. | Reflecting on the episode in a new BBC Radio 4 documentary about the state of culture criticism in our fast-changing world of AI, algorithms and influencer-critics, Hüster spoke to me about her lack of surprise at Goecke’s rehabilitation. She had always assumed he would find work again. From a highly experienced critic who has been on the scene for several decades, what does that say about gender dynamics in the arts? Shockingly, in the moments after the attack she felt grateful it had not been worse, despite her sense of violation. “I thought: ‘It’s bad – but it’s not a knife in your ribs,’” she said, and went on to describe the hate burning off her attacker, as if he bore an “absolute sincere wish to do me real harm”. |
| Hüster’s vocabulary couldn’t sound more gendered, with Goecke’s behaviour akin to that of a stalker, not an artistic director. She herself puts the intensity of his reaction partly down to the fact that she was a woman doing a critical takedown – in one of Europe’s most influential papers. But in Germany she is far from the only female critic in the field. A Berlin theatre critic tells me there are far more female culture reviewers now than was previously the case. Hüster has seen this change too. The trend appears the same for UK criticism. | Hüster’s vocabulary couldn’t sound more gendered, with Goecke’s behaviour akin to that of a stalker, not an artistic director. She herself puts the intensity of his reaction partly down to the fact that she was a woman doing a critical takedown – in one of Europe’s most influential papers. But in Germany she is far from the only female critic in the field. A Berlin theatre critic tells me there are far more female culture reviewers now than was previously the case. Hüster has seen this change too. The trend appears the same for UK criticism. |
| And yet I fear that the optics of gender parity – or at least progress – are deceptive when set against the cold, hard facts. A survey conducted in 2019 by the five-year Women in Theatre research project, whose partners include the Writers’ Guild, Women of the World and Equity, among others, found that only 10% of the reviewing corps for drama in 2017 were female. Subsequent reports in 2021 and 2023 found that little had changed for the better since the pandemic . | |
| This figure surprises and dismays me. It goes against the often-assumed pace of progress. So much so that Arts Council England’s national council governing body has just approved a year-long taskforce to investigate the underrepresentation of and discrimination against women in the arts as a result of the Women in Theatre research project. | This figure surprises and dismays me. It goes against the often-assumed pace of progress. So much so that Arts Council England’s national council governing body has just approved a year-long taskforce to investigate the underrepresentation of and discrimination against women in the arts as a result of the Women in Theatre research project. |
| Are we going backwards? Putting Hüster’s appalling experience aside, you could argue that the clashes between artists and critics nowadays are not half as fractious as they were a few decades ago, when criticism really was a macho sport with full-out eruptions of physical violence. This newspaper’s Michael Billington was at the receiving end of a blow himself. That this no longer happens is a sign of progress, isn’t it? Well, it’s about optics again, because the punches are now thrown on social media, and so often, as findings reveal time and again, women are subjected to more vociferous attacks and pile-ons than their male counterparts. | Are we going backwards? Putting Hüster’s appalling experience aside, you could argue that the clashes between artists and critics nowadays are not half as fractious as they were a few decades ago, when criticism really was a macho sport with full-out eruptions of physical violence. This newspaper’s Michael Billington was at the receiving end of a blow himself. That this no longer happens is a sign of progress, isn’t it? Well, it’s about optics again, because the punches are now thrown on social media, and so often, as findings reveal time and again, women are subjected to more vociferous attacks and pile-ons than their male counterparts. |
| There were murmurs from some corners that Hüster’s review was unnecessarily harsh. I wonder if this judgment was cast because female critics are held to a different standard, however unconsciously – and whether we are expected to be less combative, more balanced? Hüster concedes that her review came with colourful language and humour. So what? It is just this kind of combative spirit that was espoused by William Blake in his idea that “opposition is true friendship”, that is, learning that occurs in the rich tension sparked between opposite viewpoints. | There were murmurs from some corners that Hüster’s review was unnecessarily harsh. I wonder if this judgment was cast because female critics are held to a different standard, however unconsciously – and whether we are expected to be less combative, more balanced? Hüster concedes that her review came with colourful language and humour. So what? It is just this kind of combative spirit that was espoused by William Blake in his idea that “opposition is true friendship”, that is, learning that occurs in the rich tension sparked between opposite viewpoints. |
| Hüster also spoke to me of adhering to her own boundaries, never venturing into commentary that was personal or related to appearance. I hope male writers or directors have their boundaries too, especially if they approach a female critic to contest a review in person. I have had this several times, and have felt threatened by it. It’s a lonely job, as Hüster pointed out to me (and all the more so for the 10% of UK-based theatre critics who are female), but it really shouldn’t be a dangerous one. | Hüster also spoke to me of adhering to her own boundaries, never venturing into commentary that was personal or related to appearance. I hope male writers or directors have their boundaries too, especially if they approach a female critic to contest a review in person. I have had this several times, and have felt threatened by it. It’s a lonely job, as Hüster pointed out to me (and all the more so for the 10% of UK-based theatre critics who are female), but it really shouldn’t be a dangerous one. |
| Where does all of this leave the female critic? Where Hüster is, I suppose. Whatever the implications of Goecke’s comeback, it is business as usual for her. “I have not changed because of that incident,” she said. “No, that would be awful.” Indeed. | Where does all of this leave the female critic? Where Hüster is, I suppose. Whatever the implications of Goecke’s comeback, it is business as usual for her. “I have not changed because of that incident,” she said. “No, that would be awful.” Indeed. |
| Arifa Akbar is the Guardian’s chief theatre critic. She presents No Criticism, a two-part documentary broadcast on BBC Radio 4, on 12 and 19 August | Arifa Akbar is the Guardian’s chief theatre critic. She presents No Criticism, a two-part documentary broadcast on BBC Radio 4, on 12 and 19 August |
| Arifa Akbar is the Guardian’s chief theatre critic. She presents No Criticism, a two-part documentary broadcast on BBC Radio 4, on 12 and 19 August | Arifa Akbar is the Guardian’s chief theatre critic. She presents No Criticism, a two-part documentary broadcast on BBC Radio 4, on 12 and 19 August |
| Do you have an opinion on the issues raised in this article? If you would like to submit a response of up to 300 words by email to be considered for publication in our letters section, please click here. | Do you have an opinion on the issues raised in this article? If you would like to submit a response of up to 300 words by email to be considered for publication in our letters section, please click here. |
| Do you have an opinion on the issues raised in this article? If you would like to submit a response of up to 300 words by email to be considered for publication in our letters section, please click here. | Do you have an opinion on the issues raised in this article? If you would like to submit a response of up to 300 words by email to be considered for publication in our letters section, please click here. |
| This article was amended on 28 August 2025. An earlier version said that reports from 2021 and 2023 corroborated a finding from 2019 that 10% of theatre critics in 2017 were female; however, the later reports cited this statistic but did not research this any further. |