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FINAL

— IN-BETWEEN —

HERE       ——–       YOU       ——–       THERE

 

 

FRAMING IT

In-between, performed 12am-4.30pm on 6th May 2016, formed out of many different conceptual ideas that, through extended development and experimentation, became a minimalist, gallery-esque piece, which put the observer between different mediums, moments and emotions. While the piece took place in a ‘shop to let’ within the Waterside Shopping Centre on Lincoln High Street, it twisted the expectations and perceptions of what a shop should be; blurring the lines of normality and identity. We wanted to give something back to the public, breaking the cycle of consumerism that runs day by day, 9-5, giving them a chance to stop and take some time to relax.

 

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Fig.1, taken by Francesca Veil
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Fig.2, taken by Francesca Veil
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Fig.3, taken by Francesca Veil

 

Given that our site was situated in-between H&M and Roman, we felt it was even more important to reflect the breaking of a cycle as by simply using the space for something other than a shop we in turn created a visual representation of that very break in the cycle. As people walked past the shop windows they inadvertently become part of the piece as there was a monitor connected to a camera filming the walkway in each shop window (fig.1), this camera feed was also projected into the space with a chair in front of each projection (fig.2). Stood in-between the cameras and the shopping centre walkway were two of us, still, waiting; waiting for someone to have a personal and intimate moment with. Once two people had occupied the chairs we then began the same, one-sided conversation that went page by page (fig.3), the third one of us controlled the shop floor and acted as an usher. Once the conversation had come to an end the two people were then invited to switch seats and have another conversation. Following the minimalist aesthetics of the piece we incorporated that into our writing by having the same conversation but with a simple additive of the conjunctions, ‘also’ and ‘too’. The two conversations finish, the people get on with their day and the two of us are left standing with a page saying, ‘Waiting’.

Paradoxically waiting for the cycle to begin again and for the other to stop.

Throughout the process we looked into many different artists and performances and originally drew influences from artists like Adrian Howells and his intimate transactions.As the piece developed it became more influenced by artist like Dan Graham and Vito Acconci, who worked with the architecture of sites and both created minimalist work that connected with people on a personal level. We didn’t take a direct artistic influence from practitioners but more their methodologies and way of approaching concepts. The notion of intimacy still ran through to the end result and we took a heavy influence from Michael Pinchbeck’s piece, Sit with me for a moment and remember. A piece where a moment was made significant through poetic language and the medium sound.

 

 

PROCESSING IT

I’ve always been an observer, I like to take in my surroundings so on our first exploration of Lincoln High Street, which was our chosen site for the performance, it was incredible to see how much I had missed. The architecture and layout was stand out – every exposed beam, broken slate, gargoyle, back passage, wall, closed door started become the present face of a forgotten story. The multiple layers, or palimpsest, was something that stayed with us for a long time throughout the process, we continued to put meanings behind various ideas, leading to a conceptual view point for many of them. This later proved to be our down fall, where we were left with an overlapping and blurring of concepts; I will touch on this later, however.

Wondering around the streets of Lincoln we came across many areas where we would find ourselves simply looking, thinking.

Site drawing
A drawing of an area near the Glory Hole, taken by James Crawford

Walking up and down and looking high and low along the High Street quickly started to show how any slight abnormality surrounding the site is noticeably picked up on by the public. Eyes would begin to watch and start to question what you’re doing. This brought to our attention the importance of the public interaction with the site, especially the High Street, which is almost always inhabited by people. We wanted to disrupt this flow, or more considering this analogy:-

If you drop a rock into a river the ripples will eventually became part of the flow, as too will the very rock that created them.

Fleeting moments are always there but only beautiful if you catch them.

 

The social interaction became a focal point for our early practical research and experiments. Elliot, Laura and I kitted up with a note pad, pen and the question, ‘Which way should we go?’ and targeted the Lincoln public. We wanted to see how the public would react to something without context, to test preconceptions and how interactive and willing people would be. Here is a record of our experience:

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A word map of our jounrey, taken by Laura Potente

The array of responses was the most intriguing thing, with ‘What, in life?’, ‘Out of Lincoln, I don’t like the place.’ and ‘Follow your feet.’ Were some of the most significant responses we had, thanks to the absence of context or knowledge. Slighting mixing the mutual understanding of a question opened up the prospect of something new and abnormal, which we grew instantly attached to. While carrying out this experiment it’s also important to note that the simple action of approaching someone with a note pad and pen played into the norm and preconception of a High Street, they are most likely there for you information, money or 5 minutes of your time. People diverted there course and some simple ignored us and implied they weren’t interested.

Considering the idea of place and non-place, the High Street fits into the realm of non-place, and we wanted to continue this through-line within our piece and throughout our research and practical experiments. With this is mind we decided to engage with the site in a way that was semi-permanent and give a section of the high street meaning and a sense of purpose, instead of a transitional street between places. We also want to create a piece that was “Generated through trial and error, through improvisation and the testing of proposals over a protracted period” (Pearson, 2010). Pearson was fundamental to me for grasping site and we felt this notion was crucial to creating our final piece.

 

 

As seen in the video, we had a start point and drew a chalk line along a pathway that was being swept clean, we also had a sign saying, ‘Is this a test?’ and one of us recorded the whole experience. When our journey got disrupted we added a reverb to the line and if anything was said to us we wrote it along the line. When the chalk ran it, it signified the end of the journey so we left the sign at the end and walked back along our recently created pathway. Walking back it was hard to stick to the pathway and proved that anything you try to implement onto an already established order is always going to struggle to shine through.

This was also the first time we had recorded our work and it gave a whole new perspective on how we could mediate our performance. When we’re walking back along the line the video seems to radiate purpose, really dragging the watcher into the journey. The moment when the railway line barriers went down really emphasised to us the importance of spontaneity and working with your site. Catching those moments on camera verified the beauty of them and pushed this multi-media aspect of a performance to be a fundamental part to our final piece.

 

Furthering our exploration we decided to look into the Waterside Shopping Centre, Laura had always been keen on finding a space there as she had seen the Frequency Festival in an empty shop to let. She loved the use of space and could envisage many ideas within spaces like that, and to our luck there was a newly refurbished, empty shop up for let. We straight away inquired about using it for our piece, leasing with the shopping centre manager and administrator. We discussed the terms and they agreed to us using it, though, there was always the chance of the shop being let out before our performance date. This didn’t stop us from diving straight into the site and to start thinking of potential ideas. We had our site confirmed and the creative focus was aimed there, but we did for the time being, have other sites on the back burner.

We first of all loved the openness and creative control we had over the space, it was a blank canvas ready for lines to be drawn. The two shop windows at the front of the shop instantly caught our attention, we pretty much saw them as two different performance spaces – the glass giving them their own viewing screen. We also saw the windows as an opportunity to be able to stream a recording of outside the shop, inside; we felt this was essential as we wanted to pursue concepts of surveillance. Continuing that focus we quickly wanted to test out live streaming within the space, so we set up Facebook Live and streamed a short piece titled, Any Requests?, to the public of the social media site.

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Z_ZjEAzWtM&feature=youtu.be

 

After spending multiple sessions in the space and talking over initial thoughts and experiments we formed fairly conclusive idea that was based around becoming a shop, fitting in with the site of the shopping centre, and posing questions about surveillance, archives of personal information, consumerism and the general consensuses of what is ‘free’?

Shop layout
A drawing I did of the shop layout, taken by James Crawford

We thought of selling photos of CCTV cameras, barbed wire, closed off doorways etc., but they would all have the price tag of ‘free’. This was to play on the perceptions of freedom and what it means to be free if we are restricted by these system put in place. We would only ask for bit of personal information in return for a photo, this would then be stored in the archive at the back, which would store lots of other info; drawing from Howells site work and transactions. Another layer of surveillance was the camera and monitor in one shop window, which was then streamed into the archive, where people could have observed and reported any abnormal behaviour. We also incorporated an attack on consumerism in the other window, with a continual ingestion of liquid from hose pipe – a reflection of society and how we over consume.

We presented our ideas to Stephen Fossey and Conan Lawrence, our module tutors, and talking through it with them uncovered conceptual confusions and too many overlaps of ideas, as is talking about it now. We had got lost and tried to produce too much. What stood out for them, however, was the use of cameras and monitors, bringing the outside into the space, and the concept of breaking the cycle of consumerism. We got thinking and looked back at previous experiments.

While visiting Amsterdam during the process I went to De Appel, a contemporary art gallery that was hosting work by Saskia Noor Van Imhoff and Alicja Kwade. Van Imhoff produced a site specific installation piece that showed the gallery deconstructed, putting forward questions about the value we put to objects and the layers behind everything we see. (De Apple, 2016)

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The minimalist design of the piece and the focus on architecture made me rethink how we could use the architecture of our site. Could also see similarities within the gallery aesthetics of our site.

We began to see a natural mirroring within the space, the pillars provided gaps that could represent the shop windows (fig.4). Working on our feedback we formulated a transformed piece that was heavily cut back and focused on the use of cameras and projections and giving something back to the public, in-between their routine that runs through the High Street and shopping centre. We wanted to use intimacy/affection as a form of giving so started working on a script that we could show the audience, through a series of pages of simplistic, beautiful and thought provoking language. We looked into the work of Dan Graham and Vito Acconci and could see their artistic use of minimalism and architecture and this helped us reinforce our ideas. Our piece, In-between, was essential there but we had no idea what the result would be till we got into the space, with all the technical gear, on the morning of the performance.

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Fig.4, taken by Elliot Sargent

 

 

 

REFLECTING ON IT

The performance finished and we closed up shop along with the rest of the shopping centre, leaving the space as it begun. Empty, nothing. All that remains is the memory, a fleeting moment that was only caught by a few. The few that did, left the space and got on with their day feeling something, and it wasn’t all the same as the piece produced an array of individual experiences. Depending on whether you sat on the chairs or eavesdropped on the conversations from an outside perspective was the variable that produced a variety of emotions.

The people observing seemed to empathise with the ones who were having the conversation, feeling sadness as they were able to fully sense the distance and separation between the person sat and the one in the projection. I, as a performer could also feel a longing and sadness, almost turning to desperation as I knew every moment was coming to an end. This, however, didn’t hamper the lasting connection made with individuals.

 

As an individual sat in a chair that was their moment, a moment to take a break and feel. We were pushing the boundaries of intimacy and what it actually means to connect with someone, and if people even could. As the performance begun a paradox was instantaneously created as the two people sat in the chairs were thrown into an in-between world of projections and shadows, closeness and distance, intimacy and the lack of. Posing the question of whether the conversation was even real or not, yet simultaneously cementing that moment and what they felt to be the very essence of something real.

 

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Taken by James Crawford

(The shadow of the person puts them within the projection, making them feel close to the performer, yet at the same time is the very definition of the absence of something. Being in this in-between world leaves the audience unable to fully grasp reality and instead leaves them questioning it.)

The shadows worked particularly well as it enabled a physically visual connection to be created between performer and audience. Not only did it place the audience within the scene but it also, upon reflection, posed the possibility of working with the shadows more. With attempts of interaction between the projections and shadows and the use of objects to create more of a scenario or maybe this pushes too far away from the simplicity and makes the in-between world too explicit.

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Playing with the shadow, taken by James Crawford

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The complication of the mannequin display in one of the shop windows actually ended up being quite positive, they added a normality to the space, which otherwise would have been completely separate from the Waterside Shopping Centre. Looking back now it would be very interesting to see the parameters and outcomes of this performance if it were situated within a working shop. The minimalism and focus on the two individuals would disappear, though the eavesdropping aspect enters new possibilities and opens up the chance to play with moralities and ideas of connection in such an active, public space. The normality continued through the natural creation of a sound-scape; the constant hum of the Waterside Shopping Centre ran throughout the piece and as Serra says, ‘to move the work is to destroy the work.'(Serra, 1994), we really felt we had created a piece of art that couldn’t have been created anywhere else.

Not only has this process been a journey of discovery through Lincoln and its people but also the world of Site Specific Performance. This area of performance gives you the opportunity to actively engage with the world around you, interacting with people on a personal and real level. Understanding the paradigms of Site Specificity and what it means has made me see any place, space or non-place as an opportunity, a story or a moment. Theatre is not only about producing a spectacle, the entertainment suggests a distance from self, it is also about blurring the boundaries and lines of the everyday, to question and to imply a reflection of self.

 

 

 

 

Word count: 2,743

 

Bibliography:

Pearson, M. (2010). Site-specific performance. Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire: Palgrave Macmillan.

Potente, L. (2016). live. Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Z_ZjEAzWtM&feature=youtu.be [Accessed 13 May 2016].

Potente, L. (2016) In between. Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jMsIieFvDFc&feature=youtu.be [Accessed 13 May 2016]

Sargent, E. (2016). Site Specific: Chalk expriment. Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i8B4XnAQjjc&feature=youtu.be [Accessed 13 May 2016].

De Appel.(2016) Available at: http://deappel.nl/visit/programme/activity/?id=1015 [Accessed 10 May 2016]

Posted on No Comments on Site Specific Performance – High Bridge Histories – Final Blog Submission

Site Specific Performance – High Bridge Histories – Final Blog Submission

FRAMING STATEMENT

Site Specific Explained & Our Performance

Typically, theatre transports the audience to a reality apart from the everyday; [Site Specific] Performance strives to transport everyday reality to something much more.                       (Cohen-Cruz, 1998, 1)

Site Specific Performance explores the possibility of place and how theatre and performance can be two very separate things. In comparison to theatre, “performance […] requires depth in order to be an event rather than an empty effect.” (Dice Drama Network, Undated) The idea of Site Specific Performance is that of looking into a place or site’s historical, cultural and social factors: where that place ‘starts’ is ultimately up to the artist of the work. Looking practitioners such as Marc Augé, Miwon Kwon, Georges Perec and Cathy Turner, amongst others, we created our piece: High Bridge Histories.

High Bridge Histories was performed on High Bridge in the centre of Lincoln’s busy High Street on Thursday 5th May at 12pm noon. It lasted approximately 12 minutes, with myself, Emma Haigh, Joe Turner and Lucy Workman entering the space at different intervals from different areas of the place. We all had a portable speaker in our hands which played a recording of people that we had taped using a Dictaphone saying lines of speech and conversation that we had overheard around that area over the three months. We also added a number of sound effects that can be typically heard during an average day on High Bridge such as construction work, birds singing and babies crying. Whilst coming into the space at the different intervals, the group and I walked around as naturally as possible whilst doing actions such as drawing in chalk the dates in which we collected the data on the floor and throwing bread crumbs over these dates.

High Bridge is the oldest bridge in the UK and this fascinated our group. The bridge was built around 1160AD  and must have been the backdrop of some incredible moments of history; however, its purpose nowadays is to hold the hustle and bustle of Lincoln’s residents and tourists.  We decided we wanted our performance to capture how Site Specific Performance often “engenders ideas of place and community” (Wilkie, 2002, 144) to make a non-place become a place using the performativity of everyday life conversations and noises. We wanted to create a soundscape for our audience to be able to witness and listen too, so that they were suddenly aware of themselves in an otherwise transient place, thus creating memorable links and allowing them to become subconsciously spatially aware of the place each time it was either mentioned or they passed through it again in the future. We were particularly interested in Erving Goffman’s idea of everyday behaviour being a spectacle, especially during the beginning of our process. Richard Schechner enforces this idea by stating:

…performing in everyday life uses consciously enacted conventional behaviours [such as] walking down the street in casual conversation with a friend….Everyone masters to some degree or another the social codes of daily life. Rebels intentionally break the rules; revolutionaries want to change them permanently. (2013, 208)

These “social codes” are also known as tacit agreements. These can be challenged discreetly or extremely melodramatically. This was another element to the performance that we wanted to add: making people think about the space they were in and the people in it.

An Analysis of Process

Original Idea – Installation piece – Your Linc!

            At the beginning of the module our group were particularly interested in the notion of community. We wanted our performance to reach as many people as possible as it could do within the local area. Whilst looking for locations to perform our piece along the High Street, we noticed that seating areas attracted the most people. We decided that we wanted to create an installation piece created by people of Lincoln. We wanted to be able to challenge Miwon Kwon’s opinion that “‘an artist cannot accurately represent a community and, in attempting to do so, ultimately represents himself and his own work.”(2002) We wanted the community to be able to make the piece as we would not be performing: we would be merely a platform that allowed the public to write whatever they wished.  An initial idea was to have a moveable whiteboard with a drawn out map of the city. This board would then have two layers of acetate over the top which acted as physical layers, inspired by Cathy Turner and her idea of palimpsest. Palimpsest is the accumulation of layers, be those socially or historically of a place. The idea of having the different layers of acetate was so that all three types of audience could get involved with the piece, these being: the cyber audience, the unintentional audience and the invited theatre audience. On one piece of acetate, there would be tweets, text messages, emails, Facebook statuses and other forms of technological communication written on there about Lincoln. The next piece of acetate would be the live part of the performance which would allow members of the public to be able to write what they wanted to say about what they thought about Lincoln.

Although we initially liked this idea and the theory surrounding it, we decided that it was maybe too simplistic. We wanted to delve deeper into the sociology that Site Specific Performance allowed us to explore. The group also collectively agreed that the idea that we had initially thought up of sounded more like something that the Lincoln Tourist Board would want to install rather than a drama performance art piece.

Figure 1. Childish drawings on High St. Credit: Holly Marshall, 2016
Figure 1. Childish drawings on High St. Credit: Holly Marshall, 2016

Histories of High Bridge

            The group and I decided to think more about the topics of authenticity and ownership. We knew that we still wanted to do something that would be in connection with the community of Lincoln. Joe then had the idea to record people’s conversations in a social area which is when we chose High Bridge seating area. The cluster of benches mixed with the busy café opposite posed for the perfect place to begin listening for conversations. For a number of weeks, we listened and overheard many different conversations in that place as well as a number of noises such as cameras clicking, babies crying and birds tweeting. We were able to listen to a number of things: from significant conversations to passing comments to phone conversations that we only heard half of.

We were inspired during the process of this collecting and recording data by Georges Perec. His book An attempt at exhausting a place in Paris (1982) proved to be extremely inspirational to our piece as did his other observations in his collection of stories named Species of Space and Other Pieces. This book contained some interesting exercises which we practised whilst outside in the space. Perec tells us to “Observe the street, from time to time, with some concern for system perhaps. Apply yourself. Take your time.” (1995, 50) We certainly did this and spent five consecutive weeks listening to the street and feeling the space: the general mood of the site, the sounds, and the sights.

We assumed that we were the first people ever to think of this concept; however, we were proved wrong when delving into some more of our own independent research. We discovered that Dee Heddon has also created a similar style text called Going For a Walk: A Verbatim Play. (2015)  This play was created by the use of listening to people’s conversations whilst walking. Heddon adds that “This is just one possible story made from the conversations, the story I have chosen to tell (2015, Intro.) She also adds that the intention of the piece is to “…listen out for performances of planning, creativity, commitment and persistence, risk taking, resilience and interdependency, as well as listen in to diverse bodies on the move.” (Heddon, 2015, Intro.) This was ultimately different to ours in the fact that there had been time taken to choose what she wanted the characters to say to make a storyline as opposed to ours where it was random fragments of conversation. Another work that inspired our piece was a collection of short plays written by Craig Taylor called One million tiny plays about Britain. (2009) Similarly to Heddon’s play, it contrasted to ours as the collected speech was deliberately put together in ways so that it made sense and a story was formed. As a group, we decided we did not want our piece to be about stories we had created out of other people’s words, as we felt the High Street as a site represented the realities of Lincoln as a city; we wanted to do justice to this through keeping people’s words as their own without altering them.

The idea of looking at how people ‘performed’ during everyday life was incredibly interesting and something that was central to the point of our new performance. We wanted to show the beauty of mundane activities and conversations in a space we came to understand to be a ‘non-place.’ The idea of place and non-place was introduced by Marc Augé. ‘Non-space’ is the idea that places could be transient; anywhere where people merely pass through or have no real interaction with anyone is a non-place, whereas a place would be somewhere where people had communication, meaningful conversation and stayed where they were. Of course, there are flaws with this system: what about a homeless person? Surely a place for them would be the High Street as that would be their home in comparison to me where it is somewhere where I just walk through daily to get to my destination. We wanted to make sure that people were aware of the place they were in, to show that anywhere could be a ‘place’ and demonstrate the repetitive nature of life that occurred there. Sue Palmer was an advocate in our way of thinking as she states that “it’s not just about a place, but the people who normally inhabit and use that place. For it wouldn’t exist without them.” (Pearson et al, 2010, 8)

We still wanted to adhere to Cathy Turner’s idea of palimpsest whilst still using conversations and communication as the main focus. We decided to get strangers, friends and family to record the snippets of conversation that we had heard and then Lucy arranged them in a stylised audio file. The idea was that we were to play these recordings over the top of us speaking, similar to Forced Entertainments’ piece, Speak Bitterness (1994), where actors speak people’s confessions at a table over 6 hours. Having the recording and our voices would therefore create a number of layers: a live layer, a recorded layer and the layer of the original conversations that we wrote down.

“Language and media seem natural partners and enemies. My interest is in their co-existence, their frictions and the humans caught in between.” (Kaye et al, 2007, 163)

Upon feedback we received, we realised that the first audio file sounded very polished and some of the voices sounded quite rehearsed and acted. The idea of our performance was that the words were meant to be said as they were heard, completely natural and not out of place. We then took the track and listened to all of it, picking out the most natural sounding recordings and Lucy then placed them into a new sound file which we then used instead.

Figure 2: High Bridge Histories. Credit: Lucy Workman, 2016
Figure 2: High Bridge Histories. Credit: Lucy Workman, 2016

After receiving some feedback about the visual aesthetics of our piece, we added certain other layers to the piece such as drawing chalk pictures on the floor,(see fig. 1) throwing bread for the birds and using props such as baby bottles and rattles. This was meant to be an added layer for the palimpsest of the piece; however, we were told that it was too acted and less performative. We decided to cut back on the actions. Instead, we decided to write down on the floor in chalk the dates on which we collected material as well as putting bread crumbs for the birds on top of the dates we wrote. We then proceeded to clean up the dates using a scrubbing brush. When the phone ringtones rang, we gave out business cards with this blog’s web address on it (see fig. 2) This idea was so that members of the unintentional audience could then look at what we had done and then possibly share the page through interest therefore creating a cyber-audience and thus more layers.

Instead of too many physical actions, we decided on looking into depth at John Smith’s A Girl Chewing Gum. This was a piece that was shown to us by our lecturer and was very appealing to our piece. It showed an everyday scene that was then narrated over the top of to look like life was played by stage directions. We took this idea and incorporated it into our own work, deciding on instead of having predetermined speech with mime, as well as having the recordings blaring out, we would also speak in the same manor that Smith did during his piece henceforth adding another palimpsest layer to the performance.

Performance Evaluation

As if we weren’t nervous enough on our performance day, to add to the stress a busker had decided to set up right in the middle of our space. Thankfully with some gentle persuasion he decided to stop playing for us during the performance. This was just another unpredictability of working in a public site which was something that we had prepared for in advance.

As the performance was staggered, it was difficult to see how everyone else worked in the space. I feel that I did my part reasonably well and as I was the third person to enter the space I was pleasantly surprised that we had accumulated an audience of onlookers from both the street and the neighbouring shops and cafes. With all of these unfamiliar and some familiar faces watching, it was difficult not to fall into old habits of becoming a character rather than just merely performing as oneself. Instead of acting, we had “…to focus on accomplishing the set task…” (Shechner, 2013, 208) which was both challenging but fun. (See Fig. 3)

We were able to achieve a sense of ephemerality in our piece, as it was only ten minutes long, showing the pace of life and how people don’t stop to appreciate their surroundings. We wanted to merge the past and present together and I think our physical actions and the verbal sounds worked well to show this because we had audience members speak to us at the end knowingly understanding what our piece was about which was a pleasant surprise that our intentions had been so clear. Maybe if I had to improve the piece, it would be to stylize the movements slightly more as I think we looked so random, it didn’t look naturalistic as we wanted it to.

Not working within the theatre has been a challenge for me. Being told not to act but to perform was a complete shock and something that I weekly had to work on. As a naturally melodramatic person, being advised to act ‘natural’ was something I found particularly challenging as my acting natural is something completely different to someone else’s. Although this module has been filled with ups and downs, I am proud of my achievements as both ensemble member and as development for my own acting abilities. It has opened up a field in which I would never usually want to peruse or look into but I am happy that I have had the opportunity.

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Figure 2: Me on Performance day. Credit: Emily Vickers, 2016

 

WORD COUNT: 2560

 

Works Cited

Cohen-Cruz, J. (1998). Radical street performance. London: Routledge.

Dramanetwork.eu. (2016). Drama Improves Lisbon Key Competences in Education -. [online] Available at: http://www.dramanetwork.eu/educational_drama.html [Accessed 8 May 2016].

Heddon, D. (2015). Going for a walk: a verbatim play. Studies in Theatre and Performance, 35(3), pp.177-188.

Kaye, N. (2007). Multi-media. New York: Routledge.

Kwon, M. (2002) One place after another, Site specifc art and locational identity. MIT Press: Massachusetts.

Pearson, M. (2010) Site- Specific Performance. Palgrave Macmillan: Basingstoke

Perec, G. and Sturrock, J. (1997). Species of spaces and other pieces. London, England: Penguin Books.

Schechner, R. (2013). Performance studies: An Introduction. Third Ed. London: Routledge.

Wilkie, F. (2002) Mapping the Terrain: A Survey of Site-Specific Performance in Britain. New Theatre Quarterly. 18 (2) 140 – 161.

Posted on No Comments on THERE’S NON-PLACE LIKE HOME- FRANCESCA ELMER FINAL BLOG

THERE’S NON-PLACE LIKE HOME- FRANCESCA ELMER FINAL BLOG

 

Fiona Willkie in The Negotiation of Space in Site-Specific Performance defines the theatrical genre as “Performance occurring in non-theatre venues and in which the site is a vital element, instrumental in developing the theme or form of work.” (Willkie, 2004). The genre encompasses cultural theory, geography, and anthropology to create a non-traditional performance method which is heavily influenced by its surrounding context. Significantly different to traditional theatre-based practice, a prominent desire underpinning site performance is a relationship with spatial dynamics. For example, traditional proscenium theatre contains an auditorium in which an audience is seated, establishing a barrier between audience and performer. Site, on the other hand, promotes alternative performance space as opposed to traditional theatre structures. This methodology is reinforced by Mark Auge’s concept of place and non- place, he states “If a place can be defined as relational, historical and concerned with identity, then a space which cannot be defined as relation, or historical, or concerned with identity will be a non-place.” (Augé, 1995)

There’s Non-Place like Home

There’s Non-Place like Home (2016) was a six hour instillation piece performed on the 5th of May 2016 in the Lincoln Archways. A Living room was erected within the site that welcomed an audience within in the invitation of conversation, tea and biscuits. The trajectory of this blog will be to discuss the influence and decisions that lead to the final site specific performance.
The foremost stage in the process was to explore the city. Carl Lavery’s 25 Instructions for Performance in Cities (Lavery, 2005) involves a “composer” (Lavery, 2005) who creates a “score of music” (Lavery, 2005) or set of instructions for a performer to follow in real time. Applying this method in order to explore Lincoln was particularly effective in highlighting the subtle details of the city. Despite a directive approach that could be considered autonomous to follow “at no time did the instructor proffer specific advice in what form the performer should take.” (Lavery, 2005) hence allowing for individual interpretation and application of the given instructions. Instructions are not restricted and therefore can be performed through various performance modes; walking, dance, instillations, recorded lectures or digital technologies (DVD, MP3, SMS). Consequently this meant I was able to personally tailor the experience to my chosen walking method. Lavery’s direction of the city allowed me to explore and rediscover the subtle and diaphanous dimensions that are not immediately obvious to the eye. Specifically, Larvey’s seventh instruction “flânerie” (Lavery, 2005) or unmediated wanderings, incorporates various methods of walking practice as a way in which to travel and explore the space. Utilising Larvey’s concept as an exercise we designed a set of random and unmapped pathway instructions such as; take the nearest left and continue to walk for exactly 3 minutes. We then proceeded to exchange the directions amongst a larger group meaning we were unaware of the route we were to follow, thus agreeing with Larvey’s concept of “flânerie” (Lavery, 2005). This stylised method of exploration through Lincoln allowed me to notice the intricate details not overtly obvious to the preoccupied mind. [See Figure.1]

One of which being Lincoln’s historic and ornate architecture. The archway supporting the Lincoln Guildhall is often overlooked as a place of transition between adjoining sections of the high street. The space captured our interest as a piece of historic architecture lost amongst the consumerist and modern high street. The artistic research group Writes & Sites published A Manifesto for New Walking Culture (Sites, 2006) in which they encouraged the study of “mythogeography” (Sites, 2006) through their Dadaist literature. This can be described as the process to “Intertwine and subvert the official” (Sites, 2006) current function of a site with its previous historical uses or purpose. After researching the archway it became clear its role had altered dramatically since its construction in 1520 [See Figue.2] throughout and alongside the development of the high street. Over its tenure on the high street the Guildhall’s main function always been a place for governors of the city to meet, yet the building itself has been divided and extended over time creating a vast and interesting ‘mytho-geographical’ history. This included its previous function as the county prison detaining convicts between the years 1569 up until 1809. Now a derelict cellar the prison consisted of 13 ft cells guarded by only small iron gate windows. My research confirmed the decision to hold the site specific performance within the Archways due to the versatile scope of possibilities and influences that could be taken from its expansive history. Moreover, the manifesto develops the notion of architectural symbolism “view shopping malls as hyper-real museums to consumerism” (Sites, 2006) suggesting the site is more than just its primary function and represents a larger social issue. Addressing the argument raised within the manifesto, I continued to research the prison as I felt it was a huge part of local history that had since been forgotten and addressed a dramatic cultural mistreatment of prisoners in the derelict conditions.

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[Figure 2] (Lincoln archway prison, 2016)
Situated within a place of commerce we noted the archway received a high footfall of pedestrians as they walked across the high street. In spite of this many appeared to walk through the building with little awareness of their changing surroundings often appearing distracted by conversation, mobiles or thought. During an initial rehearsal, I spent time observing the site and the people who passed through and recorded an audio file [See Figure. 3]. The archways had become neglected, overshadowed by shop advertisements and the interruptions of modern life. Therefore a decision was made to create a site performance that would challenge and question the effect of the consumerist market on Lincoln’s cultural heritage. Now cluttered by rubbish and the continuous footfall of shoppers, it became easy to forget its extensive time spent as a prison that had been once occupied by hundreds of inmates. Although held captive, the cellars beneath the Guildhall had once been a place of residence and had housed a substantial population of convicts. This led us to discuss the concept of home considering how a home can be defined or classified, and in extension whether despite being a jail, a cell could be considered a person’s home.

Figure 3 (Holly Lomas, 2016) Recorded sounds of the Archway.

Home is Where the Art is 

Within Western culture the notion of home is considered as the basis of family, warmth, comfort, security and nourishment. Regardless of the geographical nature of a person’s home, whether that be a capital city or a small village, comfort is found in the closing of a front door to the safety of your own sheltered environment. During the rehearsals process we continuously examined the notion of what people describe as a home- as opposed to a house- which remained to have a clear emotional distinction. Arguably, a comfortable home includes a collection of possessions and materials that are continually altered according to the changing desires and needs of a family environment. Identity is also formed through the design of the home reflecting the inhabitants’ status, ideals and values. The idea of home became a key stimulus on the influence of the performance. It became important to challenge the accepted notion of home, and question the sites previous function as a ‘home’ or prison? In rehearsals we began to piece together the key objects we considered to be of value within our own homes. It was decided the living room perfectly embodied the concept of home and in extension comfort.
Tracey Emin’s My Bed (Emin, 1998) is brutally honest in presenting empty beer bottles, soiled underwear, blood stains and fag butts as a reflection of the artist’s life and private space. Art critic Jane Rendell reflects “the dislocation of Emin’s actual bed, this highly personal object that she had slept in, from its domestic setting to the space of the gallery, made it art.” (Rendell, 2011). I believe candid confessional nature and use of personal items establishes an intimacy with the viewer and engages the audience in a frank expression of emotions. Rendell writes on Emin “by presenting her own life story in the shape of her bed, and by transforming it into work of art, directly confronts us with our own prurient interest in other people’s lives.” (Rendell, 2011) suggesting Emin’s confrontation of the personal makes the instillation fascinatingly irresistible to the spectator. This helped to cement and form the design of the instillation, by using personal objects from within our own home environments to engage and as Rendell states “interest” an audience members fascination with “other people’s lives” (Rendell,2011).

As a group we discussed combining the nostalgic concept of home with the influence of Emin’s blunt realism. This clarified and confirmed our decision to replicate a home environment within the archways [See Figure 4]. An aim of the project was to establish a connection with audience members as they interacted and connected with the space. As Imogen Racz states in Art and the home: Comfort, alienation and the everyday “Homes are places of habits, rituals and movements, and when experiences are translated into instillation and sculpture, these also require the audience to move around and measure the work against its own bodily and mental memories” (Racz, 2015) suggesting home art instillation dictates an interaction between sculpture and audience because of its recognisable nature. Therefore, tasked with the need to make our piece as specific as possible we devised a questionnaire, asking and interviewing passes by what they consider to be home. The results showed several believed sitting down on the sofa with a cup of tea to be the embodiment of home and comfort.

Figure 4 (Lomas,2016) The Instillation.

Quali-tea conversations

In the following weeks we began to discuss our individual roles and responsibilities within the piece. Initially, the thought was to incorporate confessional exchange between ourselves and the audience.  This would involve the trade of a person’s story for a cup of tea, having previously established this was the public consensus of comfort. The process of drinking tea is well established within British culture as a common greeting and precursor to conversation, for example polite practice is to offer a ‘cuppa’ to a guest at your home as a sign of hospitality and welcome.  This semiotic practice was partly inspired by Adrien Howells “Salon Adrienne” (Howell, 2005) who created a dramaturgical structure in which clients would be invited to a hair salon to have their hair washed, massaged and styled. This bespoke style of theatre values the audience member and emphasises the importance of exchange.  Howells states “The piece Salon Adrienne is a basically an excuse for me to have a meaningful interaction and dialogue exchange with another person” (homotopiafestival, 2007) as he remains constantly attentive to the improvised moment, responding to the flow of conversation.  Howell claims people are “far more prepared as a stranger to open up to me… it’s a feminine disguise, but it is a disguise” (homotopiafestival, 2007) encouraging a unrestricted conversation masked by his transvestite appearance. I believe the playing of an eccentric fictional character removes Howell from a position of judgement, and therefore allows unrestricted exchange and conversation. In our own rehearsal process we considered and improvised playing theatrical housewife characters. We devised stylised movement to carry out domestic tasks, for example I offered the audience biscuits however crushed several on the floor beforehand to create and mirror Howells sense of performativity. Work-shopping and performing to others as these characters highlighted the inefficiently in our piece. The forced acting simply created an uncomfortable and rather inappropriate tone. However, Howell’s idea of confessional exchange or “exploiting one to one scenarios in a domestic setting” (Fierce Festival, 2007) formed the basis of our piece.

Developing this process we continued to meet and design the specifics required to create the structure [See Figure 4.].  Acquiring permission from the council meant we were able to measure and begin working out the feasibility of the piece. As a group we decided to block a single arch within the central structure using black material, the effect creating a closed and genuine room. Additionally, we continued to experiment with the positioning of furniture with the intention to create a comfortable and believable space. As practitioner Imogen Racz  states “Sculpture prerogative is to confront us with the fact of our material, physical, bodily reality, making that fact available to thought and feeling- and making it sociable, an open secret shared with others in a common space.” (Racz, 2015)

 

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Figure 5 (Calvert, 2016) Construction and measuring of site.

In Hind-site

In reflection, the performance can be deemed successful by the audiences’ reaction and participation in the piece. Before performing, a reservation or concern of mine was that enough people that would stop and feel confident enough to open an honest dialogue. However, the enormous public reaction was excellent with numerous people stopping intrigued by the room we had created within the Archways. The conversations throughout the day became increasing framed around where each individual considered home to be, how they differed from me and how the city contributed to their identity. Moreover, with the aim of establishing a relationship each conversation fashioned geographical connections resulting from even the smallest of similarities. An elderly woman and I established a connection after discussing her grandson’s recent employment with the Metropolitan police. The conversation produced a shared geographical awareness due to both having prior knowledge of the area, as I consider London to be my home. Despite having lived in a small village in Lincolnshire her whole life we created a link between the two of us through the experience. [See Figure.4]

The most surprising factor of the performance was the expectation of certain audience members that they were required to pay for the experience. Despite the sites central location within such a dense population of commerce, previous to the performance I had not considered such reaction. Therefore, an observation if we were to perform the piece again would be clearly notify and inform the audience it was a free experience in order to encourage a higher participation rate.

Figure 4  (Lomas, 2016) A conversation regarding place of home.

In reflection, the process has allowed me to discover a new and provoking style of performance. Moreover, I now recognise and value the  importance of research, and its ability to provide educated and informed decisions throughout the devising process. The experience has demonstrated how a prior  knowledge of  history, cultural theory and anthropology  can be combined through site specific performance to highlight a larger cultural statement. I have enjoyed the opportunity to work within such a unique and diverse style of performance and have learnt skills I hope to continue to develop throughout my undergraduate studies.

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Figure 6 (Walls, 2016) interaction within performance

 

Word count: 2426

Bibliography

Augé, M. (1995) Non-places: Introduction to an anthropology of supermodernity. New York: Verso Books.
Cross, J., Harvey, J. and Lachenmann, H. (2004) Identity and difference: Essays on music, language and time: V. 5. Belgium: Leuven University Press.
Fierce! Festival (2007) Salon Adrienne- Adrian Howells. Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M7XcWo2GzSo (Accessed: 12 May 2016).
Gallery, S. (no date) Tracey Emin – my bed – contemporary art Available at: http://www.saatchigallery.com/artists/artpages/tracey_emin_my_bed.htm (Accessed: 9 May 2016).
Holly Lomas (2016) Lincoln archway passers by. Available at: https://youtu.be/XcxVaEkYo70 (Accessed: 13 May 2016).
homotopiafestival (2007) Salon Adrienne. Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mmUn2ZTzeY0 (Accessed: 12 May 2016).
Lavery, C. (2005) ‘Teaching performance studies: 25 instructions for performance in cities’, Studies in Theatre and Performance, 25(3), pp. 229–238. doi: 10.1386/stap.25.3.229/1.
Lincoln archway prison (2016) Available at: https://www.google.co.uk/search?q=lincoln+archway+prison&rlz=1C1FERN_enGB607GB608&espv=2&biw=1366&bih=599&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwid9ISCkdfMAhUL6xoKHbwADJoQ_AUIBygC#tbm=isch&q=lincoln+guildhall+old+&imgrc=_l4X5Dg65443DM%3A (Accessed: 13 May 2016).
Racz, I. (2015) Art and the home: Comfort, alienation and the everyday. United Kingdom: I B Tauris.
Rendell, J. (2011) Site-writing: The architecture of art criticism. London: Palgrave Macmillan.
Sites, W. & (2006) ‘A manifesto for a new walking culture: “Dealing with the city”’, Performance Research, 11(2), pp. 115–122. doi: 10.1080/13528160600812083.
wilkie, fiona (2004) ‘Histories and genealogies: tracing site specifics’,The Negotiation of Space in Site-Specific Performance, .

Posted on No Comments on Final Blog Post- ‘High Bridge Histories’

Final Blog Post- ‘High Bridge Histories’

 

Framing statement

For our site specific performance, we decided that High Bridge would be the ideal location for our site. It is a bustling area of the high street which also acts as a resting place for people to stop and socialise due to the large amount of benches in the space. Stokes Café can also be found in the site, a café which is very popular and has an outdoor seating area situated on the street in front. After researching the bridge, we found out that it ‘is the oldest bridge in the United Kingdom… dating back to 1160AD.’ (Visit Lincoln, 2015) Due to the historical background and the social potential of the space due to the café and benches, we decided that a look back on social history would be a really interesting concept for our ‘High Bridge Histories’ piece.

During our research of past site specific work, we were inspired by Georges Perec’s book An Attempt at Exhausting a Place in Paris (Perec and Lowenthal, 2010). Influenced by Perec’s documentation of everyday life, we attempted to recreate a sense of a day at High Bridge in our soundscape. We took inspiration from Marc Augé’s idea that ‘if a place can be defined as relational, historical and concerned with identity, then a space which cannot be defined as relational, or historical, or concerned with identity will be a non-place.’ (Augé, 1995) We did this by experimenting with our sound file to physically activate the space from a non-place to a place, our performance made the site a place because it gave our audience a specific memory of that space, rather than it just remaining a random area on the high street with no meaning. Cathy Turner’s concept of ‘palimpsest’ influenced the various different uses of layering in our performance and John Smith’s use of narration in his piece The Girl Chewing Gum (Smith, 1976) inspired us to use a live narrative effect as one of our layers in the performance.

On Thursday 5th May at 12pm, we performed our piece, ‘High Bridge Histories’. Each of us held a small speaker which connected to a phones to play the sound file. We were all initially out of site, until 12pm when Joe could be seen entering the space and began the 6 minute long sound file. After 1.5 minutes, I entered the space and played the sound file on my phone, afterwards, in turn, Holly and Lucy did the same. Because each of us started the file at the different times, our performance consisted of us all doing different actions with different sounds and voices layering over the top of each other. When a date played of the sound file, we would write the date on the floor in chalk. The sound file also included the sound of footsteps, during this time, we used our chalk to outline the top and bottom of our feet. When the snippets of conversations were playing, we commented on what we could see, for example ‘Man in long black coat walks past walking a dog’. We took our inspiration for this from The Girl Chewing Gum (Smith, 1976), we differed from John Smith’s work because our commentary was live in the moment, whereas, Smith put his narration over the top of video footage. For each sound effect, we had an action which made our piece more visually interesting. During the laughing sound effect, we experimented with taking the sound in different directions out of the space. When the bird noises played, we scattered bread for the birds over the dates on the floor. When the phone noises played, we handed out business cards which gave a brief explanation of what we were doing. The final sound effect was the noise of babies crying, during this, we cleaned away our footprint chalk marks with small brushes. After each of our tracks had individually stopped, we walked out of the space, everyone’s sound track had finished after 10 minutes.

Business Card

Our Business Cards (Lucy Workman, 2016)

Process Analysis- The Initial Idea

Our original performance idea included a map of Lincoln on a whiteboard with clear plastic overlays which we would write local people’s opinions and stories about their city. Before performance day, we would have prepared a social media overlay, where we would have written people’s stories which they had shared with us on social media. The wheely whiteboard meant we would have been able to travel down the high street over the course of a day. We also wanted to record people’s stories to play through a speaker as the audience came and wrote on the board. This map idea was heavily influenced by Cathy Turner’s concept of palimpsest, we wanted to show layers physically as well as metaphorically with the white board.

Concerns about our concept began to emerge as we thought more deeply about the performance. The piece relied too heavily on members of the public coming to write on the board, we were worried that nobody would take part, but also that it could encourage people to write inappropriate or offensive things. We had also been concerned about the amount of elements we wished to incorporate, all the different elements over complicated the piece. The idea of transporting the whiteboard along the high street began to seem unnecessary, so we chose three different points along the high street which seemed like the most ‘sociable spaces’, one of these was High Bridge.

Process Analysis- A New Idea

After all of our concerns, we had been thinking about starting a fresh with something new. Joe suggested an idea which completely contrasted our first concept. He suggested that we sit in our site and write down people’s conversations, record other people saying them and then play the track out into the space, speaking along with it on performance day. We began collecting conversations from the space and asking members of the public if we could record them saying various lines from the script of conversations which we have written up. Inspired by Perec’s book An Attempt at Exhausting a Place in Paris (Perec and Lowenthal, 2010), we decided that if we were to use sound effects in the piece to create a better sense of the everyday. So we wrote down what else we heard in the space, this included: builders, babies crying, buskers and birds. Our idea differed from Perec’s project because, unlike us, he did not write down conversations, only what he saw, heard and smelt.

Lucy began to compile the final sound file, which came to just under 20 minutes in length. We decided that the piece should have a mixture of the conversations and the sounds which we had collected. In rehearsals, we experimented with different ways we could perform the piece as the soundtrack was playing. Our idea was to have one speaker, attached to a laptop which would be playing the sound track. We attempted to talk along with the track by reading our script along with it but this proved very difficult because of how fast the recording was. We experimented with speaking along with some of the sound file and miming other parts.

As well as experimenting with how we could deliver the piece vocally, we also decided to work on our physical delivery of the piece. We decided that we should have a movement for each sound effect. For the footsteps, we experimented with using chalk to draw around our feet. This linked well with Cathy Turner’s ideas of palimpsest because we were physically drawing a layer over the top of what is already there. For the building site noises, we were going to use a shovel to sprinkle gravel over the site. The bird noise was physicalized by us throwing bread crumbs around the space and into the water behind our site for the pigeons and swans. We bought dummies and baby bottles to suck on for the baby crying noises, and when the child noises played, we drew childish pictures on the floor in chalk.

 

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Chalk Drawings (Joe Turner, 2016)

 

After a meeting with our module leader, we received feedback which could improve our piece. We were told that the piece was too long and that it was not visually interesting enough. We were also told that we were acting too much and that the piece should look as naturalistic as possibly. We were told that quite a few of our visual aspects didn’t work and just looked a bit odd, marking the footsteps worked and so did feeding the birds. We were told that the piece could be cut right down to 10 minutes, but the soundtrack would need to be re-recorded due to the voices on the track sounding far too acted. We were also told that we had a budget, so instead of just having one speaker, we could have one speaker each.

Because of the short timescale, instead of re-recording the entire sound file, we went through the recordings and got rid of the voices which sounded the most acted and kept the ones which seemed the most naturalistic. We were left with a 6 minute soundscape, by entering the space at different intervals, we were able to ensure our piece was 10 minutes long. When we were all in the space with the speakers, you could only hear what the speaker closest to you was playing, so having all four speakers playing different sections of the sound file which made waking through the space interesting because of the different layers of sound this produced.

We also altered the visual aspects of our performance. Our module leader liked the idea of us incorporating the dates where we recorded conversations into our performance in some way. We came up with the idea of including these dates in our sound file, to show the dates as a visual layer, we also wrote them on the floor in chalk. Instead of just sprinkling the bread anywhere, we decided to put the bread over the dates, therefore creating another layer which the birds would remove by eating it. Instead of drawing around the entirety of our feet, we decided to simply draw a quick mark at the top and bottom of our feet. We experimented with washing away our footprints after we had drawn them, this can be seen in the video below:

Practising Ideas (Lucy Workman, 2016)

We practiced using the narrative effect we saw in John Smith’s The Girl Chewing Gum (Smith, 1976), changing the technique to make it our own by commenting on people’s appearances live, rather than over pre-recorded which can be seen in Smith’s piece.

Performance Evaluation

An hour before the performance, we arrived at High Bridge, where to our horror, a busker was setting up ready to perform. After speaking to him, and explaining what we were doing, to our relief, he agreed to stop playing during our performance.

The warm, sunny weather we received on performance day played a large part in the success of our piece. The pleasant weather meant there were a lot more people leisurely walking about on the high street, benefitting our performance because it meant we had quite a few members of the public stopping to view our piece there were also people sitting outside Stokes Café who acted as additional audience members. During our rehearsals, we had been asked on numerous occasions what we were doing. In preparation for the possibility of this happening on performance day, we prepared a brief description of the piece: ‘A performative look back on the aural history of High Bridge’. After saying this, our plan was to give them one of the business cards and point them in the direction of our blog. Nobody asked us during our performance, however, when we had finished and went back to clean up, a couple told us they had been watching and wondered if they could have more information, so we explained and pointed them in the direction of the blog. It was nice to hear that people were interested and had stayed to watch the whole piece.

During our performance, a group of musicians could be heard playing further down the high street. After reflecting on the performance, we realised that the music added another layer to the feeling of everyday life that we aimed to convey through our piece. I felt that entering the space at different times from different areas of the high street worked well to make the activation of the space more visually interesting. The speakers worked very well during our performance, I think having one each added another interesting dimension to the performance. The visual aspects of the performance, such as the marking of footsteps on the floor and the writing of dates in chalk looked interesting and the scrubbing brushes and spray bottles worked as we had hoped they would.

During the performance, we had a few problems with our props. The chalk became an issue because they snapped so easily, meaning that members of the group had trouble writing the dates of the floor. When we had finished, Joe told us that his phone dropped out of his pocket, but I didn’t notice this during the piece, so I think he did a good job of recovering from this. Before we started performing, we were worried that we wouldn’t have any birds flocking to eat the bread off the dates an essential aspect to the performance. The adding of bread and then the bread being eaten represented a layer being physically added and then taken away. We were relieved to see the pigeons eating the bread from the dates during the performance. If I could improve the final performance, I would have made sure we had had a few more rehearsals to make us feel more confident in the final performance. We wanted the performance to have an element of spontaneity, which is why we had fewer practices but I feel that if we had rehearsed a bit more, we could have had fewer mistakes and it would have perhaps looked more professional overall.

Site specific has completely altered my understanding of what it means to perform, I always believed that performing and acting meant the same thing but site specific has taught me that they are completely different things. When you act, you make your actions stylised and exaggerated but when you perform, you can simply be doing an action as yourself.

Word count: 2498

 

References

Visit Lincoln (2015) High Bridge. [Online] Lincoln: Visit Lincoln. Available from http://www.visitlincoln.com/things-to-do/high-bridge [accessed 11 May 2016]

Perec, G. and Lowenthal, M. (2010) An Attempt at Exhausting a Place in Paris. Cambridge: Wakefield Press.

Augé, M. (1995) Non-Places: Introduction to an Anthropology of Supermodernity. London: Verso.

Turner, C. (Nov, 2004) Palimpsest or Potential Space? Finding a Vocabulary for Site-Specific Performance. New Theatre Quarterly, 20(4) 373-390

Ewwtubes (2012) John Smith- The Girl Chewing Gum 1967. Available from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=57hJn-nkKSA [accessed 10 May 2016]

Posted on No Comments on – Eleanor and Edward 1254 – Final Blog Post – Rayanne Brackenbury –

– Eleanor and Edward 1254 – Final Blog Post – Rayanne Brackenbury –

FRAMING STATEMENT

My piece was titled Eleanor and Edward, 1254. Our performance was founded through the use of historical content to create a physical journey, which an emotion or feeling (Love) is transported and revealed. This performance has been made immortal due to the recreation of ‘Eleanor’s Crosses’ and other mediums. The idea for our piece was based around the theme and emotion of Love and its representation within Lincoln in modern day and the 13th Century. The reasoning for the title of our piece is based on the sentimental love story of Edward I and his wife Eleanor.

As well as this influence we were inspired by many other practitioners such as Mark Augé and his theory of place and non-place and Deirdre Heddon’s practice in using personal experiences and others experiences to create he work. For this module our group’s site was Lincoln high street and our performance date was the 5th May, 2016 and began at 4pm until 4:45pm on the same day.

OUR PERFORMANCE

Our performance began with my group and I creating a procession from where the high street meets Speakers Corner to just before the Stone bow Archways whilst transporting a 90 x 90 wooden box. As we made our final step in the procession we placed the large wooden box in the centre of the performance area. We all then collected a smaller box to stand on and placed ourselves as if the large box was cross section in our man made cross. We then took to our individual roles as ‘Town Crier’s’. In turns we would declare three of the 18 villages to the audience and the members of the public before then stepping off the smaller boxes and proceeding to the large box. We would then start carving names, initials and dates of the researched couples we had found. Whilst one member of the group was carving the remaining three were declaring in more depth the stories behind the initials. This was performed in a true town crier style. At the time of another group member beginning to carve in to the box the three members stood on boxes held up their cards as if to signal a new stage of the journey.

Once every one of our group’s members had carved for a total of 4-5 minutes we all raised our cards again to signify yet another stage. We all then gathered our smaller boxes and created an outward facing box with our backs touching the larger box. We then in the same order as the carving we all called out the title of our piece,’ Eleanor and Edward, 1254’. This was the signal for our group to all then step off our boxes and begin to carve together. This was intended to act as a closing curtain for the invited audience and members of the public as there was no more performing just visual instillation.

The audience for our performance were invited to the procession to become an active role within our piece. Yet the only interaction we were granted during the performance was if they audience Members began asking questions about our performance or the overall project. Further audience interaction came in when we stepped of our smaller boxes and began a relaxed styled, in depth speaking that was directed to members of the audience. The repetitive movement from on the boxes to off the boxes symbolised to the audience us as ‘town criers’ coming out of that specific role and becoming a less traditional town crier

ANALYSIS OF PROCESS

The thought that anywhere can have the credentials to become a performance space sent my mind reeling. The process of making our performance took some time due to minor disputes over the initial idea and what the best direction would be for our group. Due to the broad boundaries of what site specific performance is, finding the right form to incorporate all of our individual ideas was the most challenging aspect. By the 3rd week session we had gathered our thoughts, had three pre-session meetings and established the theme for our piece. We had decided that the performance base was going to of an emotion that everyone has witnessed or experienced themselves, Love and Romance.

This aspect of incorporating emotion and Lincoln City brought us to the realisation of our first influence. Mark Augé a practitioner within the site specific field whose theory distinguished the question of what makes a place, a place. In his book “Non-places: Introduction to an Anthropology of Super Modernity” he explains the framework behind his theory. “Clearly the word ‘non-place’ designates two complementary but distinct realities: spaces formed in relation to certain ends (transport, transit, commerce, leisure), and the relations that individuals have with these spaces…” (Escdotdot and Sanderson, 2006) To summarise his book he says that we spend a large amount of our lives in side supermarkets, airports, on motorways and hotels. These areas don’t deserve the gratification of being classed as ‘places’. He does clarify these areas but as places of transit. His theory was applied within our performance to justify our site. In relation to his theory our site would be classified as a place of transit, as the middle of high street is a place that people walk through to get to another place. It is not a social space for people to create memories. Unlike a restaurant or the home of each individual. For us to create a performance that people of the public stopped to view it, we created a place. For us it will now be remembered as the place that we performed our site specific performance, but also the emotion both my group members felt and the public felt for watching our piece. This feeling of emotion experienced gives a site the gratification of a place. Being it has now become somewhere that a group of people have experienced a feeling and created a memory. The same thing we realised it was a very common experience that many had shared.

From the very beginning of this process I was certain that I wanted to include a very large visual installation within our piece. This idea was invited into the group as another group member insisted that she also wanted the same style. Because our performance was based on love we wanted to make a loose connection between us the performers and the audience. I was enticed with Deirdre Heddons autobiographical pieces. I decided to research into Heddon’s work to gather inspiration for our piece. Her use of personal experiences and meshing them together with others experiences really connected with our piece. In a book written by Heddon “Autobiography and Performance” a brief over view of the way she handles her workings. “ Heddons engaging style seamlessly blends the theoretical and personal, pursing proactive question around issues of ‘truth’, identity, personal history and political agency, confession, voyeurism and ethics.”(Heddon, no date) Heddon’s inspiration broadened our views as a group to what we could use as a connection between ourselves and the audience. We decided to use the large box as a carving stand. We all remembered when we were in secondary school, in our first relationships. This led us to the carving instillation of our piece. When we were younger, carving both the initials into a wooden surface was a way to express the immortality that our love represented. When asking older generations of the public whether they had also done the same thing, we realised it was a very common experience that many had shared.

 

During the weeks building up to the performance as a group and individually we had gathered research into couple of the general public within Lincoln and couples we knew from all over the U.K. some of these stories we gathered were very detailed about the couple, exactly were they met, how old they were, what their favourite place to go together was. Each week as a group we would take the same journey (from our starting position to the end site) together collecting further couples details that would soon be engraved upon our box. We were introduced in the 5th week’s session to another site specific practitioner. Sophie Calle. This woman’s work focussed particularly into human venerability, intimacy and identity. One of Calle’s performances, Suit Venitienne, 1979 gives a clear understanding of her work. It looks into the tacit agreements within society (boundaries that aren’t discussed but expected to be followed, e.g. when someone falls over you don’t laugh you just keep walking.) And were the boundaries can be. For this piece she followed a stranger known as ‘Henri.B’ from Paris to Venice. She disguised herself and followed his every move gathering photographic and written evidence of him. The intimate connection both our pieces shared was the repetitive journey along with the photographic and written evidence. Although our performance didn’t go to the extremes she did with her one participant we applied the same theory to our featuring couple. King Edward I and his wife Eleanor. The couple had made a trip together from their home in London to the City of Lincoln. They sought rest in 18 different villages until they finally got to their destination. As the pair arrived together Eleanor fell sick, thus resulting in her death. Whilst Edward was grieving for his recently deceased wife, he ordered for 18 ‘Eleanor Crosses’ to be erected in the centre of all 18 villages. This was a token of his never ending love for his queen, as a memorial for the villagers to remember her but most importantly the last journey they took together. The journey this besotted couple took together was full of deep, loving emotion with intention. The intentional journey connected to our performance and our influence as all journeys had intention for either emotion, information or in our case both.

PICTURE OF ELEANORS CROSS

During my research I decided to look for influence from a difference source. Frantic Assembly, a theatre company that has perfected the art of using visual instillation and movement. With the pure intention to make their audience feel a deep connection through emotion towards their piece. A specific project the company successfully executed that reached out to me in relation to my performance was ‘LoveSong’. (Petsas, no date) The writer Abi Morgan created this piece based on a couple in their 20’s and their relationship. “Lovesong intertwines a couple in their 20’s with the same man and woman a lifetime later. Their past and present selves collide in this haunting and beautiful tale of togetherness. All relationships have their ups and downs; the optimism of youth becomes the wisdom of experience. Love is a leap of faith.” (Petsas, no date) This synopsis of the performance is a true explanation of just what the piece involves. The company’s use of silent physical theatre and a disturbing set creates a contradicting atmosphere for the audience. This mirrors our performance due to our use of the procession the harsh reality of life and how relationships can have their darker times. Yet our overall theme for the performance is about the beauty within life through the medium of love.

John Whalley and Lee Miller a husband and wife duo that shared a love for performance. They lived in two separate areas which entailed each meeting having a commute along the M5 motorway. As they travelled alternately the conversation between the two developed to mention how many bottles of urine were scattered along the hard shoulder. This sparked a thought between the pair to create a performance, “Partly Cloudy, Chance of Rain”. The pair’s performance consisted of them driving along ‘their motorway’ and replace every bottle of urine they found and replaced them with an object. We were going to include the giving to receive portion of their performance, however we soon realised that it wouldn’t fit within our piece. This was not the end of the influence our group took from this couple. They then perused a different style and used Augé’s theory within their personal life. Whalley and Miller renewed their vows within a Service station. Augé would have classes the service station as a non-place yet for anyone who was there to witness the renewal of vows would now class that as more than just a service station. Because of the emotion and performance witnessed and experienced there. This related to our performance as we had used the same emotion to create the same effect within a non-place.

 

PERFORMANCE EVALUATION

On the final performance day we delivered a performance that succeeded in everything we set out to do. There was an invited audience which we didn’t actually end up meeting until we had arrived at our final site. When we got to our destination there was approximately 15 of our invited audience. We also had a constant flow of public audience members which would on average have got to 9+. The audience seemed to connect with what we were doing as we had some members ask us personally what we were doing. This allowed us to step of the box and perform to that individual our overall concept. The reception we gained from the audience was very positive. They were connected with our cries and also very receptive to the structure in the centre. Their eye contact was constantly referring back to ‘Eleanor’s Cross’.

After the performance was completed we then proceeded back down to our starting position where as a group we discussed our opinions. It seemed as though our views on the piece were overall positive and joyous. When I had had time to adjust after the adrenaline rush I began thinking about what I would have done different had we been able to do it again. I now know that I would have used the four different road ways leading off from our structure to their full potential. I would have played with the length away from the centre we were. For example when a new carver took their place I would have maybe had us move our smaller boxes further out and spoke in a louder, more projectile manner. Visa versa for if we were to go closer to the box but our voices would become softer and not as harsh on the ears.

As far as improvements go for the final performance I would have made my crier more established. I would have created a more confident presence once speaking. From my personal performance I would have liked more of a chance to interact with the audience. To be able to direct one of my stories a little more to them. As when I performed it the stories I had to read were rather short and sweet which didn’t give me a lot of time to develop a personality.

Site Specific Performance has opened my eyes from an actor’s point of view as to how I enjoy performing in in a space that is not a stage. The opportunities and broad boundaries can really allow for sophisticated thinking. The opportunity to view work from this field opened my eyes to practitioners that I have never heard of. If it wasn’t for this module I would never have had my brain opened to what a graciously beautiful planet we live on. Everything has potential it’s whether the eye of the beholder can see it.

REFERENCES

 

Bibliography

Eliot, S. (2008) The Eleanor crosses: A Love Story in stone. Available at: http://timetravel-britain.com/articles/history/eleanor.shtml (Accessed: 12 May 2016).

escdotdot and Sanderson, E. (2006) Marc Augé – non-places: Introduction to an anthropology of Supermodernity. Available at: http://blog.escdotdot.com/2006/08/28/marc-auge-non-places-introduction-to-an-anthropology-of-supermodernity/ (Accessed: 13 May 2016).

Heddon, D. (no date) Autobiography and performance. Available at: https://he.palgrave.com/page/detail/?sf1=barcode&st1=9780230537521 (Accessed: 13 May 2016).

Petsas, A. (2014) Productions · frantic assembly. Available at: http://www.franticassembly.co.uk/productions/past/ (Accessed: 13 May 2016).

Petsas, A. (no date) Lovesong · frantic assembly. Available at: http://www.franticassembly.co.uk/productions/lovesong/ (Accessed: 13 May 2016).

Citations, Quotes & Annotations

Eliot, S. (2008) The Eleanor crosses: A Love Story in stone. Available at: http://timetravel-britain.com/articles/history/eleanor.shtml (Accessed: 12 May 2016).

(Eliot, 2008)

escdotdot and Sanderson, E. (2006) Marc Augé – non-places: Introduction to an anthropology of Supermodernity. Available at: http://blog.escdotdot.com/2006/08/28/marc-auge-non-places-introduction-to-an-anthropology-of-supermodernity/ (Accessed: 13 May 2016).

(escdotdot and Sanderson, 2006)

Heddon, D. (no date) Autobiography and performance. Available at: https://he.palgrave.com/page/detail/?sf1=barcode&st1=9780230537521 (Accessed: 13 May 2016).

(Heddon, no date)

Petsas, A. (2014) Productions · frantic assembly. Available at: http://www.franticassembly.co.uk/productions/past/ (Accessed: 13 May 2016).

(Petsas, 2014)

Petsas, A. (no date) Lovesong · frantic assembly. Available at: http://www.franticassembly.co.uk/productions/lovesong/ (Accessed: 13 May 2016).

(Petsas, no date)

BOX BEING MADE
BOX BEING MADE
Box on performance day with engravings
BOX ON PERFORMANCE DAY WITH ENGRAVINGS
PICUTER WE TOOK OF THE CROSS AS IT STANDS TODAY
PICTURE WE TOOK OF THE CROSS AS IT STANDS TODAY
WHAT IT LOOKED LIKE WHEN THEY WERE FIRST ERECTED AND DESIGNED
WHAT IT LOOKED LIKE WHEN THEY WERE FIRST ERECTED AND DESIGNED
THE STATUE OF THE EDWARD AND ELEANOR THAT IS WITHIN THE DETAIL AT LINCOLN
THE STATUE OF THE EDWARD AND ELEANOR THAT IS WITHIN THE DETAIL AT LINCOLN
WHERE EXACTLY WHERE OUR FINAL SITE AND PERFORMANCE WAS
WHERE EXACTLY WHERE OUR FINAL SITE AND PERFORMANCE WAS