Had a very full and fun day on VLP today.
This morning we had a group production meeting and broke in to four small groups to explore and present next week, various possibilities for the performance. We are concentrating more for this exercise on physical/practical parts of the performance i.e., our ideas about the space and how to use it, and aspects such as lighting etc. rather than the narrative side of things.
The four groups came up with these ideas:
- playing with the form of the dead(?) body on stage, investigating how to play around with it, from stretching the form,to treating it heavy-handedly.
- trying to give the audience a sense of the photographic, limiting their view to a lens-type viewing hole. Adding or changing lenses to give a blurry image. Playing on the idea of what you can see is only that which is in the photograph, and nothing more - so, for example, when figures that have had their backs to us turn around, the spectators are still not able to see their faces, with the use of masks or make-up.
- using screens to play with the idea of photographic planes and layering. Bringing members of a photographic crowd scene, out of the photograph and in to the audience's space.
- using shadows and lighting to distort sense of perspective and distance from the action.
The four groups will present their ideas for the performance in a real sense on Tuesday and then we will all discuss which elements to use and how to combine them in the final piece.
After this I finished learning how to screen-print. I love the effect it has, the clean lines and intense colour and also how quick the process can be. But I also would like to try placing colour upon colour, or layer upon layer to create a blurry and more complex image. Perhaps I could have a go blowing up small parts of the Brassai photographs and printing them on to canvas?
And finally this evening we had a workshop that investigated the presence of performance. For some (me included) the activities, such as standing in the middle of the circle of people to make one's presence felt, started off as being quite a challenging thing because of not coming from an acting background. However, as the evening wore on, I sank in to it, and began to lose some of my inhibitions, so that when we were using real, everyday objects as performance tools, the umbrella became almost an extension of myself and I lost my initial cynicism! As Douglas reminded us, it is important to remember how to play, and not always be so serious and focused on research!
I also had an emotional experience but was not brave enough to talk about it with the group. When lying on the floor with our eyes closed picturing ourselves in a place, I immediately transported myself back to my cottage in New Zealand, sitting on the doorstep in the sunshine, with a cup of tea in my hand, listening to the sound of the river down below. I could see and feel everything so vividly. My friend who died on 28th June whilst I was in New Zealand, walked up to me, and smiled and gave me a tiny wooden box. I slid the lid open and inside was a dead but perfectly formed butterfly, wobbling slightly as it delicately balanced inside the box. I closed the lid, and placed the box inside the main body of the heavy, dark wooden piano that stood just inside the front door, and it is still there, hidden. I breathed in deeply and took in the atmosphere of the room that I know so well and miss so much, and my friend disappeared.
