Bobby Baker performance

Four shows per day of 30 minutes each over one summer weekend

Chelsea Physic Garden, London

Set within a marquee on the lawn of London’s oldest botanical garden, A Useful Body of Herbs was an installation and performance about women’s wisdom and knowledge of herbs as medicinal remedies. Within the tent, Bobby Baker presented a life-size ‘herb woman’, displayed on a village fete-style trestle table comprising an assembly of nine different types of herbs grown within a wooden woman-shaped planter. Leading her audience through tasks and demonstrations, Baker discussed her choice of herbs, which had historically been used by herbalists to control, contain or treat women’s ailments.

Commissioned by the Royal Court Theatre for Barclays New Stages Festival