Second thought best
It’s been a busy few weeks with starting my a-n Re:view meetings, co-curating an upcoming exhibition, viewing studios and looking after a six-week-old baby. I have had a bit of a creative revelation since my meeting with Lowri Evans and an awkward email correspondence from a museum open mic event. For this project I have always been split between two concepts, the museum connection seemed the most structured and the other less defined. My second idea is more visual creating a costumed character, like a mascot symbolising international exchange between Manchester and Tampere. After speaking to Lowri this second strand has become more crystalized in my mind and has more potential to go beyond Finland. Although Tampere is known as the Manchester of Finland there are other cities that make this reference. For example other cities known as ‘The Manchester of…’ are in Osaka, Japan and Ahmedabad in India.
For the past few years I have imitated foreign characters taking inspiration from drag/beauty queens and female hosts. The ‘host’ costumes can look pretty ridiculous, particularly the recent Sochi Winter Olympic ladies. They unfortunately looked like human plant pots. I have become more intrigued by how I can develop international relations on a local scale. Could the public make suggestions, challenges for me to achieve in each city. The work could be documented online or filmed, maybe even made into a stage performance further down the line. Since focusing more on this idea, connections between visual art and performance venues are making more sense. This also follows on from an awkward email conversation; a response from a museum open mic event that I thought would be a good opportunity to perform part of the Mansi character. Initially the organiser thought the project looked interesting, but didn’t get it! Oh dear I thought. This has made me question how creative can I really be in the museum, as they like to deal with facts were as my performance would be a creative interpretation.
Ideas for International Exchange
Get a local baker in Tampere to sell Eccles cakes
Plant the seeds of a Tampere plant in Manchester
Give basic Finnish lessons for free
Teach Manc slang
Demonstrate traditional/contemporary dance moves
Talk about the art scene in both cities
Be a tour guide for one hour
Welcome you from the airport
Parade the streets in costume
Have a special ritual re-enacted at every exchange
First Re:View Presentation
Last week I had my first a-n Re:View meeting with performance artist Lowri Evans and upcoming producer Catherine Shaw at Contact Theatre. I used my iPad with a PDF slideshow of my past work and Manse Project 15 brief outline. Ian Smith, designer and my lovely husband designed the A4 marketing leaflet, which I was really happy with the layout and stock it was printed on. I can use this portfolio leaflet to give out to my peers at future meetings and take them with me to Finland. In an age where we tend to communicate in digital media it was nice to have a physical object to give to people that represented part of my work. Lowri and Catherine commented straight away on liking having something to read, take away for themselves and give out to potential contacts. Ahead of the meeting I had skyped Catherine and already it feels like I have a second brain on the project which is a luxury as I am used to doing everything myself. She is producing new performance and intervention events such as Spectacle and Derelict (http://www.derelictlive.org). It was clear from our conversations together that like myself she is really passionate about intervention work. Catherine has also assisted Lowri on projects and programmed her performance work. Due to the short timeframe with Lowri on this occasion she has offered to skype, stay in contact through email and be available to support me during the project, which I am delighted about.
I only had an hour with Lowri as she is leaving the country in a few days time touring her performance The Secret Life Of You And Me in Brazil (http://www.thelowri.com/the-secret-life-of-you-and…). As the time was so precious I focussed on talking about three pieces of my work, my reasons for wanting to plan a larger piece and my Manse Project 15 ideas. I will email her further questions about her work, touring and funding which she can get back to me at a later date. Lowri seemed excited about the project and early on was making helpful suggestions to my questions and concerns about moving my practice forward. She could see similarities in both our practices and could relate to the frustrations of intervention work being a little undervalued in representation, promotion and pay. Although we both agreed that this kind of work is being more recognised and programmed although there is still a long way to go. In the past I have relied on the arts organisation to market my performances that hasn’t always been completed. Lowri suggested making sure I personally invite contacts for specific reasons to come and see my work, whether they show or not it’s still really important to do it.
As I am applying for an ACE research and development grant I was unsure whether I should be making a performance during that period. It might seem really obvious that I should but I have been focussing on planning, gathering research material, networking and observing performances. I had thought of inviting a small group of people to review the performance development, however Lowri and Catherine were encouraging me do this as an intervention at a programmed event. From my experience performance scratch events always want new work and I hadn’t really thought about approaching them to showcase a work in progress. This was a good suggestion as intervening the work in real time and space rather than in a studio environment is the best way to start testing, and reflecting on the development of the piece. I was questioned why I wanted to do this project, why was the Finnish connection important to me? If I could crystalize my reason why, that this could help focus the project more. Although as I am at R&D stage I feel reluctant to keep to one reason as generally my work is very open and tends to refine later as the project evolves, sometimes not even knowing until after I have made the work. These are some other points that came up during our discussion, lot’s to think about anyway…
Be clear on what you want from people.
What am I trying to achieve?
Call MOSI maybe I am speaking to the wrong contact to programme my work.
Use a known strategy in the performance such as the ‘tour guide’.
Why not explore second strand developing international relations between the two cities.
Be clear on vision of project even if it is over a longer period.
