Men Who Dance (installation)

The installation version of ‘Men Who Dance’ as presented at the Peacock Theatre, SAC on the final day of our lab.
– Matt

Byzantine Mum & Coffee/Petals/Transport task

Installed version of ‘Byzantine Mum’ and the ‘Coffee/Petals/Transport task’ aftermath presented in the Sidespace Gallery at SAC on the final day of our lab.
– Matt

“Jump as high as you can”

Men who Dance

Performers:
Andrew Harper
Matt Warren
Sean Munro
Boerge Schiwy

Deb choreographed this piece for untrained dancers to the 3rd movement of Phillip Glass’s ‘Symphony #2’ and the choreography was conveyed to them live on stage as a series of projected text instructions.

This task was explored in a couple of formats – as a test performance as described above and then also as a performerless installation in the theatre – the lit stage, audio, numbered floor markings and projected instructions greeting visitors who entered by walking straight out on to the stage.

Few visitors felt moved to actually follow the directions, but I think this number would increase if the context and framing of the installation changed – i.e. if people were visiting the installation specifically rather than stumbling across it from the Arts Centre courtyard.

I love the performance of it and it is easily one of my favourite works to have come out of the lab.

-Sally

Snaps from a Bombora

Post failure

Failure

Machines for Failure is an idea I haven’t talked about much here.  Somewhat sculputural, my idea was to construct this simple machine of a pulley, hook and rope for each of us, where a flour bomb created a weight to support over ones own head: when your arm fails to support the weight, you are bombed.

As you will see from the video below, it didn’t work.  I misinterpreted the way an arms natural leverage gives out and made flour bombs that refused to break.

Given the time constraints of the lab it was a one-shot-only and we didn’t get it.  But I love the visual of this work and the point in the video where we have just begun and are waiting for something to happen has all the tension I was hoping for.  I would have loved to do it using bags of pigment in the red, green, blue of the ropes too but pigment is VERY costly and highly poisonous (!) so that needs some more thought.

It’s a failure but a with a definite future.

– Sally

punchclock

The images flicking by here are of the task I eventually titled Punchclock.  The initial premise was this –  A Plasticine ball is kept in the space and every time we walk past it we touch it leaving an imprint. It is photographed daily.

Well,  it turns out a large mass of Plasticine is quite a dense and suprisingly ‘hard to mark’ substance.  In the cold of the theatre where it resided, even more so.

So rather than a gentle measure of daily wear, it became an object we pinched and punched and threw and wrung.

I’d like to try this again in a different form.  A plasticine doormat I think would better register the kind of movement and wear I was hoping for.

Pretty, orange blob though, hey?

-Sally

Byzantine Mum

Here are edited excerpts from the 1 hour sitting of the tableaux.  Audience were welcome but it is this video record that I think will become the ongoing work.  Deb is sourcing the right screen for it which will be framed in an appropriately Byzantine manner and it will hang on the wall simply looping like a small icon.  The audio is a live remix Matt did alongside the tableux of a recording Deb made in Cyprus.

This was also a delicously meditative task (for me at least) and the ‘fail’ elements we had built in to replace Arthur in case of distress were entirely unnecassary.  He remained calmly, happily himself for the entire task – sleeping, eating and playing for the hour.  On an entirely sentimental and maternal level, this document is wonderful to have.  As an artwork it feels pretty complete.

We were struck, looking at the footage after the fact by how Arthur moved us through a series of recognisable Christ poses from art history, even becoming a Pieta at one point.

I love this work.  So does my Mum. Great idea Deb – thanks for orchestrating this one.

-Sally

Inspiration: Gaultier’s Pain Couture

Writing about the coffee/rose task and its possible outcomes reminded me of visiting an exhibition at the Fondation Cartier in Paris in 2004.  A collection by Jean-Paul Gaultier, Pain Couture was a stunning exhibit of baked gowns and accessories.  With a working bakery downstairs (decorated with the failed and process couture experiments – something that impressed strongly upon me.  People should do it more.  Love thine error.) and a boulangerie upstairs staffed by exquisitely beautiful young French folk wearing expositions of the traditional bakers whites, augmented by bread basket corsets – some displaying a quiver of baguettes at the back.

I bought a small and very delicious Gaultier brioche – half the dough dyed navy blue and twirled against the white to parody the stripes of his signature shirt.

This is the kind of thing that could work fantastically for the rose/coffee refreshment stations.  If only he were free to design some wait-staff uniforms…

Image pinched from Hapsical: Fashion, Art, Culture

-Sally