Co-funded by the
Creative Europe Programme
of the European Union
Creative Europe Programme
of the European Union
In 2017, Catherine Hoffmann’s ovary and fallopian tubes were removed after a 10-pound cyst was discovered in her abdomen — a cyst the size of a 22-week-old baby that she named Leonard. How did it get there? Was it the fault of the egg cell and follicle, or had Catherine herself conjured them up through underlying emotional causes? The director and performer recorded her thoughts and experiences in a diary, which would later form the basis for a show about illness, (re-)production, sexuality and aging. During the creative process, Catherine Hoffmann spoke to many other women about what she had experienced, immersed herself in the world of gynaecology and retrieved lost knowledge about the female body.