After that weird process of wondering, talking to other people, reading about other people's projects and looking at other work we have taken the first steps on this journey
I have invited a number of women artists to a meal- at the Barracks, B arts base, to find out if we have a group of women who would like to make work together, who like the idea of making a different sort of performance piece in North Staffordshire- where we live/ work.
I know so many good women artists based and working here and who need opportunities to do what they do, experiment, try stuff out and could get more support and enrichment from working with each other.
I am inspired by The Magdalena Project- an international network of women theatre artists and seen first hand (if only briefly) the power of the work that can be made in that environment.
And I don't know what will happen
It's exciting, terrifying even, but I feel impelled to try.
10 comments:
women+burlesque+sex
Well, I think I have to get rid of what came through my (apparently) quite obsessed head when I was listening and watching us at our first meeting : Cath's stories about a piece of leather, and swinging and bondage + Peta's enthusiastic motivation to do something "burlesque" + so many strong women characters + so many of our big laughs ....
I had those images of Cindy Sherman's burlesque-grotesque works :
http://www.cindysherman.com/images/photographs/Untitled250.jpg
http://www.cindysherman.com/images/photographs/Untitled255.jpg
http://www.cindysherman.com/images/photographs/Untitled1992.jpg
... and I thought "Oh my God, this is very intimidating !!!" ... but I guess I've got too much imagination ....
CelineSD
ok, technical problems, apparently the links I gave don't work, what about this one (you'll guess what images I am refering to ... :) ):
http://www.cindysherman.com/art.shtml
HELP if this doesn't work !
ok so this has taken me what feels like an age - technical issues for me too! and prepare y'self i do go on!
anyway
i feel i protected my anxiety and easily battered creativity amazingly during that 1st meeting and once home became very excited, enthusiastic and felt positively hyper about it all - luckily i found myself a lovely book to write in.
at 1st i was thinking about 'control' and thought about footsteps - making a path of footsteps for people to follow around the spaces, something hilary said about how people walk through it. you walk on the footprints and they could turn into a dance in some rooms or little footsteps like the giesha (spelling)girls and maybe lots of different footsteps that represent different women's lives/stories. walking someone else's footsteps - life.
i also thought that a/the room/s could be about how 'i'm just like my mother' for us all - but i haven't been able to get overly excited about that one at th moment
and finally i also got stuck on caths leather story - which is my leather story - and i got happily stuck on how interpretations are so fascinating. at 1st i thought how every room could be the same story but different interpretations - so interesting! but i found that that felt far too ???something ......
anyway i am still interested in the leather story and th play on how different mine and caths stories were of the same event and what a beautifully sinister environment/image/performance/photography a morph of both stories could create. and usually i would be feeling like celine about it- in fact intimidation i don't mind this time but i really want it to have a feeling of s&m but not at all sexy - this is about a child making fetish gear amongst a load of other children making pretty purses. thanks cath x
ok so this has taken me what feels like an age - technical issues for me too! and prepare y'self i do go on!
anyway
i feel i protected my anxiety and easily battered creativity amazingly during that 1st meeting and once home became very excited, enthusiastic and felt positively hyper about it all - luckily i found myself a lovely book to write in.
at 1st i was thinking about 'control' and thought about footsteps - making a path of footsteps for people to follow around the spaces, something hilary said about how people walk through it. you walk on the footprints and they could turn into a dance in some rooms or little footsteps like the giesha (spelling)girls and maybe lots of different footsteps that represent different women's lives/stories. walking someone else's footsteps - life.
i also thought that a/the room/s could be about how 'i'm just like my mother' for us all - but i haven't been able to get overly excited about that one at th moment
and finally i also got stuck on caths leather story - which is my leather story - and i got happily stuck on how interpretations are so fascinating. at 1st i thought how every room could be the same story but different interpretations - so interesting! but i found that that felt far too ???something ......
anyway i am still interested in the leather story and th play on how different mine and caths stories were of the same event and what a beautifully sinister environment/image/performance/photography a morph of both stories could create. and usually i would be feeling like celine about it- in fact intimidation i don't mind this time but i really want it to have a feeling of s&m but not at all sexy - this is about a child making fetish gear amongst a load of other children making pretty purses. thanks cath x
this is funny - this is us and it makes me laugh!!!!
the leather story
peta's burlesque which might also be in her mind something grotesque and distorted and probably not like Cindy Sherman which seems to be on different terms somehow.
Swinging and bondage that can only be Burslem I dont think it counts for anything it was just the thought of all these people in disguise - something that they are not... people with little power taking it back from those who have power just for a night up a side street in Burslem then back to selling cars, looking after children and the elderly - shopping in Farm Foods not a gimp mask to be seen (or is there a remnant or a glimpse?)
I think the kid in the leather story was doing that - taking power and showing a glimpse of it to others - much to their horror (making smashing little purses!!!!!)its funny my leather kid was not a tragic character at all - could have and should have been maybe?i suppose? - just didn't see it that way - couldn't have imagined it that way either.
cx
Hey Hey
Let's not get too tied up with S&M references, burlesque is the grotesque comedy that exists in the world. Challenging beliefs, images, and most of all deep deep laughter. Would love to make an audience roar and push the boundaries of costume to make physical gags with good ole traditional theatre methods.... Ms Demeanor.. me too doin' the disguise thing.. making masks! You my sista or what!
I said it makes me laugh not because what we have said is funny...just because i forget we are scary!!....not really but it could look that way!...
Story.....
Sermerssuaq... (an Eskimo Story)
Sermerssuaq was so powerful that she could lift a kayak on the tips of three fingers. she could kill a seal by merely drumming on its head with her fists. she could rip asunder a fox or a hare. Once she arm-wrestled with Qasordlanguaq, another powerful woman, and beat her so easily that she said: "poor Qasordlaguaq could not even beat one of her own lice at arm-wrestling". Most men she could beat and then she would tell them: "Where were you when the testicles were given out?". Sometimes this Sermerssuaq would show off her clitoris. It was so big that the skin of a fox would not fully cover it. AJA, and she was the mother of nine children also!....
It's true!
cx
I so don't know why I worry about what to do
The room is flooded with stuff already.....
sex
footsteps
water
bondage
clitoris
big laughs
out of step
journey
grotesque
light
fox skin
power
purses
Silhouettes are dancing in my mind
I'm remembering a time
when I was without you
It's true what they say
ya gotta work hard every day
Smile and the world smiles with you
cry, you cry alone . .
It sets the tone of things to come
the way you want things to be done
the way you want them to be said
the way you want them to be read
THAT'S LIFE
Stand on your own 2 feet and hold your head up high
That's life
stand on your own 2 feet and have some pride
You gotta be strong to hold your tongue sometimes . . . .
you gotta be free and let the world see the real deal. . .
sometimes!!
THAT'S LIFE
Stand on your own 2 feet and hold your head up high
Stand on your own 2 feet and open your eyes wide. . .
OPEN YOUR EYES WIDE
And let the world see the REAL DEAL
That's right!!
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