Artist Talk - Week 12

Talking about myself - fine.  Talking about myself as an artist - much more difficult.  My script and the stills from giving my first ever ​Artist Talk  reveal my tentative approach to this task...

Can I call myself an artist?  If so, what do I want my art to say?
What is my identity as a performer?
Looking back to my original artist statement on the home page of my website, I am embarrassed.  It seems very naive.
The Performance Lab has challenged me to reconsider my identity as a performer, to see myself as an artist.  It has led to me exploring in depth, and sometimes painfully, ‘the argument that performance functions as a useful and rigorous means of engaging with different kinds of knowledge, including those that might not be otherwise accessible.’
I have had to examine the value of pain, both physical and psychological, in researching and devising performance.
My body has recalled a maelstrom of gymnastic and dance routines; Feldenkrais, tai chi, yoga and capoeira moves; the stillness learnt from life-modelling and theatre tricks like how to stand in the light so your face is illuminated (or not). I have remembered how to sing in my own voice again.

The FADS space was like coming home.  I bask in it.  It is a space were I can play, take risks and it has very pleasing tech.  The lighting rig graces the header on my homepage and has even been a character in one of my films, embodying a safe environment.

Learning more about live art has been a revelation.  LADA a haven.  There is a bibliography of some of my early influences as well as my new discoveries on the scrapbook page.  I have tried to add hyperlinks where I can as references, click to find out more.

How the Performance Lab process unfolded:
​(click on the week to access the blog post)


Week 1   Theatre as a context for experimentation


Week 2   Selina Thompson, I was gutted to miss this but the family wedding took priority and was suitably fabulous.          Researched Selina’s work, read salt .  Impressed and inspired.


Week 3   Playwriting, storytelling and adapting


Week 4   Modes of performance


Week 5   Pushing form further


Week 6.  Action Lab #1


Week 7.  Reading week


Week 8.  Staging work - pitching and All Goes to Pot


Week 9   Running workshops and sharing your practice


Week 10   Jay Miller and The Yard Theatre


Week 11   Action Lab #2

So where to next?  

That is what the coming semester is for.  I am confused and that is perfectly acceptable.  More dance, more stillness, more song and more silence.

Today it seems as though live art is where I fit, but I celebrate that theatre is where I am from.