Nov/Dec work outline

practice-theatre / Thu 1 Dec

am

Emma Hedditch discussed her own practice:

– That her performance work has developed over time, often in collaboration, with artists and others, resulting in the generation of a set of questions relating to it that she will post

– Using video to describe a relationship between camera & performer, subject relations and positions, combining with text that considers philosophical, personal, aesthetic space, representation itself, politics and the production of images and subjects

– Often material is recycled across different projects

– Use of bedding as a material element in the work, standing for/used as prop, comforter, veil, curtain, screen, indicating domestic/private space, the making public of these things, concerning sexuality, care, rest, a sense of elsewhere

– The development of devices to adopt different voices in the work, creating a split subject, self-questioning, text becoming performed characters identified by a prop or gesture

– The relinquishing of control for the sake of opening/allowing the possibility in a situation

– Transformation as material fact, a genuine possibility, the possibility of change and its effect on reality

– Youtube video of UC Davis silent protest: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LfEZpyoAlXw

 

We discussed Gertrude Stein’s ‘Plays’:

– How her writing activates reading through simple vocabulary, repetition, minimal punctuation

– Syncopated time – time on stage different from that of the audience – which results in a kind of ‘nervousness’ interpreted as an opening of the senses

– The position of the audience in relation to the stage, relations of control between stage/audience

– The curtain: in GS she refers to an actual curtain, though it could in fact be anything, not just the physical object – we can create our own curtain, maybe it is impossible to remove the idea of it completely, is the curtain conceptually present as soon as one is noticed?, a dividing between speech and silence

– How we come to know characters, over time, in multiple directions; redefining character as a relationship between space/time somehow re-socialises power relations

– Daily life considered as a scene, as an act

 

Tour of Theater aan de Rijn:

– Theatre is a production house, developing new work from choreographers/directors and teaming them with trained professionals as needed

– Artistic director acts as dramaturg, selecting & advising on works

– Artists permitted to realise a max of 3 works each

– Not a repertory theatre

– The importance of synchronising information, schedules and budget

– Foyer space

– Auditorium, 84 seat capacity, 10m x 10m stage, also used as rehearsal space

– Technical box now located inside the auditorium and previous space now used as wardrobe and as a viewing position for late-comers

– 6 week rehearsal periods for productions

– Currently funded by a combination of money from the city, government & co-producers where possible

– Demolition of performance venues in Arnhem

– No more production houses in The Netherlands after 2013 to receive funding, exploring alternative models

– History of building ranges from artisans to Masonic Lodge, & the People’s University who extended and built the space now used as the auditorium

 

pm

Generating text:

Divided into 3 groups, train station, shopping arcade, cathedral; to take a still position for at least 30mins and write a text in response to that, thinking about how to describe what other people are doing and what you are doing.

 

Group exercises:

Numbers game, group arranged in a line.

From different positions in the room reading extracts of text out loud, based on the numbers game model.

In 3 groups, combining reading out loud with physical movement – 2 groups adopted 2-2-1 formations, and one developed their own structure, using the work we’d done last month, with the possibility for any one to join another group

Using 2 mics, facing each other, one speaker would read a text and the speaker opposite describe what the other was doing.

 

Discussion of physical work:

Awkwardness of relying on previous work while introducing a new element

Difficulty of combining speaking/reading with movement

Difficulty of moving between groups

2-2-1 structure produced a speaker whenever someone was left as 1, consciousness of vulnerability and need for support in that, speakers could be nominated by others walking away, i.e. a removal, as well as by a stepping forward

Need for more physical, possibly vocal and conceptual warm-ups before physical work

Interest in manipulating volume of speech via microphones

Possibility of exchanging texts, swapping authorship/roles, speaking without reading

 

Resulting questions/ideas:

What does it mean to be looked at?

What is difficult in being looked at?

How can we not be looked at?

Removal produces an act (like the UC Davis video)