Week 5 Pushing form further

My daughter, Rosa, appears just at the end of one section of the video footage so I checked with her if she was OK with me using it.  She was but didn’t want to see the resulting video.  We had shed tears and shared hugs when we had visited the derelict site of Our Lady’s.  She had been there with me as a very small baby when I was a patient.

I called the piece “Who we are/Where we are” and started with a direct address to the audience.


This is the text of my introduction:


Hello, Kia Ora


When the idea of this task was introduced, I freaked out a bit because voice can be problematic for me


Once when I was very poorly I became selectively mute.


Briefly.


There was no physiological reason for me to stop speaking.


I just did.


(move from centre stage left to centre stage right)


When I am skinless
when my skin is so thin


Thinner than membrane under eggshell


                than cling film
                                  gladwrap
                                  cellophane 


than the membrane between the layers of an onion 


Then I am fragile
                     frail
                     feeble


Then 
I
have
no
voice




(play video of Our Lady Hospital with Sue Curnow’s voice over, chorusing with her from “we project ourselves”.  When the video stops I carry on speaking Sue’s transcribed script bringing the recorded sound and content completely live into the space.  Slowly I repeat key phrases)




the voice
identity
our history
our genetic make up


we project ourselves
making concrete     
(in our heads)




tied up with who we are
where we are




It went OK.  I was proud of making myself vulnerable and being brave.  Less proud of the execution, but once again had to remind myself of the experimental nature of the space.