Tag: Jade Nicholls

Considering Our Performance

Lacey Cole / / Cultural Terrorists, Evaluation

We have finally performed our site specific piece, after months of development and discussion. Naturally, there are some elements that we consider less successful, and if we were to perform this piece again, it is likely we would want to be able to alter these elements. I felt our performance fell into two sections essentially, the first half in which we smuggled the Big Ben sculpture into the Usher Gallery and the second half, which seemingly began as soon as we took our balaclavas off. The difference in these two sections in terms of pace gave a much more durational feel to the piece I think, despite the 25 minute run time. This was achieved by slowing down the performance once the instillation had been built. I think this was a very successful way to stage the performance as it gave the audience time to consider our actions of ‘terrorism’ in the first part, compared to the leisurely elements of jazz music and books introduced in the second section.

However, we found a few things that could have been improved. Due to the nature of the site, we were not allowed to eat or drink in our performance area, and thus our original idea of having a quintessentially British tea party once our sculpture had been completed became obsolete. Instead, we reapplied lipstick and read leather bound books. It seems a shame that our tea party idea had to be scrapped, as the variances between the first and second sections could have been much greater and more focused on the differences in class levels traditionally found.  The ladylike nature of our 1920’s costumes could also have been emphasised through this tea party, although after some discussion it was noted that our costumes had a significant impact, especially the dissimilarity between the dainty stockings and lipstick worn with black balaclavas.

It has also been discussed in depth if in fact Big Ben was an appropriate sculptural model to create; given the feminine styling we gave the performance, as it is clearly a phallic object. However, we maintain that our focus was not meant to be on the femininity versus masculinity of the Gallery or its creator, but rather on our own personal history relating to that object. Given that Big Ben is a widely recognised building, we found inspiration in the way Janet Cardiff’s 1999 ‘Missing Voice’ piece ‘seeks to alter viewing conventions more traditionally associated with tourist’ spots (Gorman 2003, p.168). Instead of our audience seeing Big Ben as London, we wanted them to look past that and see their own roots in whichever city or town they feel closest to. The feminist take is of course, another way of looking at our performance, and an interesting one at that, which we would very much like to explore should we have the opportunity to create anything similar to this piece again.

missing voice

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Missing Voice, Audio Tour (1999)

 

References: Gorman, Sarah (2003) ‘Wandering and Wondering: Following Janet Cardiff’s Missing Voice’, Performance Research 8, no.1.

Author: Lacey Cole

Last Minute Considerations

Lacey Cole / / Cultural Terrorists, Development

As with any drama performance, we have had a few last minute things to consider in relation to our piece. Firstly, costume. Although we have organised our 1920’s costume and props, the question of shoes still remains. Having come to the conclusion that heels would probably not be feasible, we have decided that boots will be our footwear of choice. Whilst they clash with our costume, the balaclavas will also do this, and we feel make more of a statement considering the nature of our performance and the idea of ‘terrorism’.

Secondly, our means of transport. Whilst our London iconography is an obvious theme throughout the piece, it seems impractical to have a black taxi as we originally wanted. Having spoken to various taxi companies, it seems we cannot guarantee we will have a car waiting outside once our performance has finished, and we feel it is necessary to have our performance framed by the arrival and departure of a car. Therefore we will be using Fotini’s car instead. Although it is silver, we hope this will have more of an impact as we will be able to drive faster and it may have more of an element of a get-away car.

Despite these elements, it seems our performance is coming together nicely, and will hopefully have the impact we desire.

Author: Lacey Cole

The message and affect we hope to create.

Fotini Efstathiou / / Cultural Terrorists

As we have previously stated the reasoning behind our performance is to smuggle the culture and cosmopolitan nature of London in the shape of the Big Ben into Lincoln. The reason we have chosen the Big Ben is due to it’s recognisable image and an instant association with London. The clock has become a symbol of London, particularly in the visual media and this factor also incorporates our use of newspaper as it emphasises the importance of the media in such a cosmopolitan city. Another reason we have chosen the Big Ben is that it is also a clock tower and so incorporates the history of The Usher Gallery itself as James Usher was a clock maker and if you walk around the gallery there is an abundance of clocks dotted around. The Big Ben sculpture we have created is of a vast scale and the reason we have made such a large object is because we want to make a big statement, if the sculpture was small we would not capture the attention of the audience as much or make such an impact. We want people in the gallery to stop and take interest in our performance even if they were not there intentionally wanting to watch but get enticed in.

Another factor that will entice the passers by is our use of soundscape. We have asked a fellow member of our class to begin the track ten mintues before our intended arrival and we have decided this so that the impact we are intending to create has a chance to build, hopefully the audience will begin to wonder why the soundscape is playing and it’s significance. We have decided on the idea of arriving in a speeding get away car to emphasise the idea of smuggling and cultural terrorism, this as well will hopefully entice passers by to come into the gallery to see what is going on. The soundscape is busy London traffic followed by the chimes of The Big Ben…it then begins playing music from the 1920’s and this brings us to the second part of our performance.

Susan Bennet states in her book ‘Theatre and Museums’ that ‘the use of live performance by museums to provide an encounter with a past that is brought to life'(Bennett p7, 2013). and in a sense this is what is created in the second part of our performance as the balaclavas are removed. It is evident that we are women from the 1920’s due to our costume which is quite authentic with a flapper style, stockings and pearls. Our posture and style of movement will change to capture the elegant woman of the 20’s whilst reading our leather bound books and observing the art of the gallery as the 1920’s Jazz fills the room. In a way we are capturing the history of The Usher Gallery as that was built in the 1920’s and so we are reacting a typical scene expected from women from the era. This calm, elegant demeanour will continue until we leave the gallery to capture the history of The Usher Gallery but to also emphasise the contrast between the two parts of our performance.

Works Cited:

Bennett, Susan (2013) Theatre and Museums, Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan

Author: Fotini Efstathiou

Completion of The Big Ben!

Fotini Efstathiou / / Cultural Terrorists

The Big Ben has finally been completed. After many trails and error of how to fix the newspaper to the structure we decided on double sided sticky tape and duct tape around the edges for a neater finish. We  firstly used staples but we decided it looked extremely messy and ruined the professional look we are aiming for to create the big impact we want. The use of the black duct tape around the edges frames the newspaper emphasising it’s importance and the cosmopolitan lifestyle of London. We decided on the use of The Daily Telegraph as it is published in London and has been running since 1855 only a few years before The Big Ben was built in 1858. We now need to practise constructing the tower in a timely manner, smoothly and professionally.

image_1367325460763867IMG_1438

Author: Fotini Efstathiou

The Pleasure of Treasure

Lacey Cole / / Cultural Terrorists, Development, Inspiration

With our sculpture continuing to be built, I thought I’d take some time to consider other parts of the performance. I was interested to read an article recently on the Pleasure of Treasure, a site specific piece based in London which gave people the opportunity to follow clues on a city-wide scavenger hunt. Since the piece was based in London, it was thought-provoking to read and in fact has some similar elements to the performance piece we are now creating. The Artangel group, initiated by Kathy Battista, recreated maps from 1868 merged with contemporary maps for those taking part. Our initial idea bore some relevance to this, as we discussed the idea that previously where the Usher Gallery stood it was just woodland, and the bringing together of what used to stand and what now does stand in the space was considered. We also had a chance to look at some older maps of Lincoln in the Lincolnshire Archives, which may have added an interesting element, as we discussed covering Big Ben with maps of London or Lincoln. This idea has evolved and we are now looking at incorporating both the history of the site and modern elements.

Another part we found struck a chord with us was the final effect the Artangel group wanted to produce with the walk. As we want the audience to consider their personal attachments to a city, the group wanted people to question ‘what they thought they already knew about… inner-city London’ (Battista et al. 2005, p.431). This idea of wanting people to query where they live and what they know about their roots and the city they feel comfortable in is prevalent in both site specific pieces. Along with this we also wanted to consider the ‘overlapping histories that make up urban space’ (Battista et al. 2005, p.439), in accordance with both London and Lincoln, with the idea that we’d be able to overlap both cities to create our own version. I feel this is somewhat close to what we are working towards, two intersections of historical places overlapped in order to become our own personal culture.

Although not much is documented about this particular site specific performance, other pieces by the Artangel group can be found on their website at www.artangel.org.uk.

References: Battista, Kathy et al (2005) ‘Exploring ‘an area of unnatural beauty’: a treasure hunt around King’s Cross, London’, Cultural Geographies, 12: 429-462.

Author: Lacey Cole