its a whole new world...
hooooooray! the old hotel is done and dusted. Part 3 is officially the final chapter.
I have to start a new diary now as I hadn't planned anything beyond 5th September, except my little trip to Seville next weekend (whoopee!).
Am so relieved and pleased. We had a little technical hitch, which meant the on-site audience didnt see as much of the webcam as i would have liked, but apart from that it was great. Carolyn did a wonderful job as Fee on site - "concentrated and totally believable" was one of the many positive comments on her performance. Suzon, James and Liz ran the on-line performance very smoothly - with top marks to Liz for some especially beautiful drawing. Mark - who helped me direct the on-site bit was an absolute dream from start to finish, keeping me calm and helping carolyn to really push her performance to a level i couldn't have managed on my own.
On-line, we broke the record for Upstage, with 35 audience members. They were logging in from dubai, USA, spain, australia, new zealand, england, poland, the netherlands and belgium!
On-site we had a lovely time, we were at capacity with 20 people and the wine was flowing, thanks to our accomplished compere Gareth.
thanks to all who took part, audience, performers, and every other kind of support. I pulled in so many favours for this show - I hope you all know how grateful I am - Suzon, James, Liz, Carolyn, Gareth, Lizzie, Jack, Witek, Steve, Philly, David and Jane, Mark W, Mark S, my Dad, Helen, Vicky, Karla, Doug, Vedran, Beni and Selwyn.
Friday, September 07, 2007
Thursday, August 02, 2007
Tuesday, July 31, 2007
another long gap in my blogging, i'm getting very lax. well, i suppose the research paper was a good excuse - congratulations VLP bods on getting those done!
just the final show in september to go!
its the final push now and it looks like it might be uphill all the way. I still don't have confirmation on my site (hopefully part of an art/performance festival in an old timber yard in peckham) and i've lost my actor, not a great start - but we will prevail!
I would like to make this one much more simple and contemplative, leaving the audience more room to make their mark. I wish i had time to explore some more software and stuff - would really like to do something with the Nintendo Wii, it's my latest nerdy obsession. But I will have to work with what i know for september or else there will just be too many unknowns. Still, I think the simplicity of upstage has its own appeal and i like that it riles the techno-junkies with its general clunkiness. Just need to work on the graphics and not trying to do too much.
hmmm... then there is the documentation space in college. i really want it to be something interesting - am excited about the possibilities, but need to think hard about what i want to represent of myself since most people who see it won't see my show.
just the final show in september to go!
its the final push now and it looks like it might be uphill all the way. I still don't have confirmation on my site (hopefully part of an art/performance festival in an old timber yard in peckham) and i've lost my actor, not a great start - but we will prevail!
I would like to make this one much more simple and contemplative, leaving the audience more room to make their mark. I wish i had time to explore some more software and stuff - would really like to do something with the Nintendo Wii, it's my latest nerdy obsession. But I will have to work with what i know for september or else there will just be too many unknowns. Still, I think the simplicity of upstage has its own appeal and i like that it riles the techno-junkies with its general clunkiness. Just need to work on the graphics and not trying to do too much.
hmmm... then there is the documentation space in college. i really want it to be something interesting - am excited about the possibilities, but need to think hard about what i want to represent of myself since most people who see it won't see my show.
Saturday, July 07, 2007
WOOOO WE DID IT
Well, 'the old hotel part II' went without hitch (almost). I am so relieved. we had a power cut on site just before the show, then the webcam wasn't working, but it all came good with seconds to spare. Suzon, James and Liz did their bit online very smoothly, they kept to the time limit and worked all the elements on stage as if it was the easiest thing in the world (this was the first time we had got through the script with a technical failure!). Jonny (on site) interacted with both the webcam and the projected image and confidently drew the onsite audience into the weird world we had created on upstage, whilst also grounding in the site (the work was site-specific). I couldnt have asked for more.
Of course there were so many things i could have improved on - the presentation on site, the amount of rehearsal jonny was able to have with proper working webcam (none!), parts of the script etc etc.. would also have been great to have someone experienced to help me direct the show (in particular to help jonny with improvisation and interaction - i did my best but he pretty much had to work it out on his own - what do i know about acting? Saying that though, I think he did an amazing job, but would have been less stressful for him with proper direction.) HOWEVER time, money and friendly directors with nothing better to do were not on my side, so I think we did pretty well. Was very exciting to be back on the building site, not knowing from one day to the next which rooms would have floors, ceilings, windows etc. The guys were still working on site this morning and had to down tools for half an hour so the show would be audible! Fun fun.
Will try to write a more objective analysis when i have a bit more distance and will also give a link to the film of the show which will be uploaded to my website shortly. In the meantime, here's some pics of rehearsals.
Wednesday, June 27, 2007
Friday, May 18, 2007
collaborating and writing
the rehearsals for 'the old hotel' are getting very exciting, although at the moment we are still devising rather than really rehearsing. We have decided to have just one actor in the site, telling stories one-on-one to audience members, whilst the performers online act as ghosts or memories for those stories. We are focussing one story in particular which was devised by Jonny during the perforamnce at 'Sitelines210407', which was about a relationship which focussed around visits to seedy old hotels and eventually deteriorated. jonny made the story really interesting by talking about the hotel rooms as if they were a character - perhaps his lover - in the story.
suzon has been producing some fantastic graphics which allow us to do some really exciting stuff wth the webcam, with the 'subject' in different positions in relation to the camera, coming up close, moving further away disappearing behind 'walls' and re-appearing in windows. During the performance, the camera will be on the actor and he (and the on-site audience) will be able to respond to the online performance as it will be projected onto a wall in the site. We need to work out how what the actor is saying will be fed into upstage, as there is no sound element with the webcam bit.
my paper is well underway, a couple of thousand words to go. I feel like it is a bit muddled and less coherent than last time, so am looking forward to getting to the end so i can go back through and organise it better. Although I felt very restricted by last time's 5000 word limit - and even make a habit of compaining that 10,000 is too short (what a geek) - am finding it tough to expand without waffling, having packed what i felt were my most important ideas into the smaller word count for last time. Have tried re-structuring and hope when i read back through it will be ok... hmmm...
the rehearsals for 'the old hotel' are getting very exciting, although at the moment we are still devising rather than really rehearsing. We have decided to have just one actor in the site, telling stories one-on-one to audience members, whilst the performers online act as ghosts or memories for those stories. We are focussing one story in particular which was devised by Jonny during the perforamnce at 'Sitelines210407', which was about a relationship which focussed around visits to seedy old hotels and eventually deteriorated. jonny made the story really interesting by talking about the hotel rooms as if they were a character - perhaps his lover - in the story.
suzon has been producing some fantastic graphics which allow us to do some really exciting stuff wth the webcam, with the 'subject' in different positions in relation to the camera, coming up close, moving further away disappearing behind 'walls' and re-appearing in windows. During the performance, the camera will be on the actor and he (and the on-site audience) will be able to respond to the online performance as it will be projected onto a wall in the site. We need to work out how what the actor is saying will be fed into upstage, as there is no sound element with the webcam bit.
my paper is well underway, a couple of thousand words to go. I feel like it is a bit muddled and less coherent than last time, so am looking forward to getting to the end so i can go back through and organise it better. Although I felt very restricted by last time's 5000 word limit - and even make a habit of compaining that 10,000 is too short (what a geek) - am finding it tough to expand without waffling, having packed what i felt were my most important ideas into the smaller word count for last time. Have tried re-structuring and hope when i read back through it will be ok... hmmm...
Thursday, May 10, 2007
moving on
so, the next stage of 'the old hotel'...
i have started collaborating with artists Suzon Fuks and James Cunningham (www.igneous.org.au) who are based in Australia and Liz Bryce, based in New Zealand. We are meeting regularly in online stage software Upstage (http://upstage.org.nz) to devise a performance for the Upstage performance festival 070707. The piece will be based around the threads of stories that began to be told at 'Sitelines210407'. The online element of the performance will be projected back into the 'real' space of the old hotel, like a ghost of the building and a live performance will take place in the space with two actors simultaneously with the online performance. The performance in the space will be feed back into the online performance by means of webcam.
We have been trying out different ways of using still and moving (animated/webcam) imagery in upstage, its all pretty exciting. I have had a tutorial with Vicki Smith from Avatar Body Collision (http://www.avatarbodycollision.org/) on using the webcam. Here's some screen grabs from my experiments with it:
so, the next stage of 'the old hotel'...
i have started collaborating with artists Suzon Fuks and James Cunningham (www.igneous.org.au) who are based in Australia and Liz Bryce, based in New Zealand. We are meeting regularly in online stage software Upstage (http://upstage.org.nz) to devise a performance for the Upstage performance festival 070707. The piece will be based around the threads of stories that began to be told at 'Sitelines210407'. The online element of the performance will be projected back into the 'real' space of the old hotel, like a ghost of the building and a live performance will take place in the space with two actors simultaneously with the online performance. The performance in the space will be feed back into the online performance by means of webcam.
We have been trying out different ways of using still and moving (animated/webcam) imagery in upstage, its all pretty exciting. I have had a tutorial with Vicki Smith from Avatar Body Collision (http://www.avatarbodycollision.org/) on using the webcam. Here's some screen grabs from my experiments with it:
Friday, April 27, 2007
its all over... for now at least
phew, what an adventure. Having spent all of saturday saying to myself "i'm never doing this again. No really Cherry, never do this again, don't do it to yourself!" I have spent the time since saying "that was great, let's do it again".
It was nerve-racking and incredibly hard work, but we pulled it off and "the old hotel" went without a hitch (more or less) - although that's not to say i would do exactly the same again - so many interesting problems and ideas raised... where to start...?
First, the performers. They did their jobs perfectly. It was really interesting to see the difference in the two pairs (Rich and Jonny (A&B) and Ming and Mel (B&C)), as they had rehearsed separately and gone about it in two completely different ways. Rich and Jonny had worked very quickly, getting through the entire text once or twice in every rehearsal. They came off the book later in the week, but had gone much deeper into the thoughts behind the words and how they might use/subvert these. Because of this they were able to be very flexible with audience intervention and general presence/noise. Mel and Ming, on the other hand, worked through each scene much more slowly and thoroughly and focussed on accuracy rather than flexibility. The result on their side was a quieter more crafted approach to the scenes, which seemed to draw the audiences just as effectively as Rich and Jonny's energetic approach. I hope I will be able to work with Mel and Jonny for the next stage of this project too, so we can keep building on what we have rather than starting from scratch again (Rich and Ming will be working on their own performances in July).
The audience. Something you can never quite predict. How interesting to see how people's reactions changed over the course of the night. At first people listened intently, but by the 4th installment (there were 15 'scenes' spread across 90mins with 3-4 minute gaps between each), they started to realise that their full attention was neither necessary nor expected and began to drift off into groups, just catching bits here and there. Some parts went completely unnoticed - just a conversation amongst the crowd, others had people shushing and straining to hear. One thing that was common to every part was that as soon as a 'performance' was recognised, the audience drew back to a 'respectful' distance - and then complained that they couldn't hear!!! One brave audience member asked me if she could ask the performers questions, I said 'of course' and she walked straight into the middle of a conversation between rich and jonny. What was really wonderful about this was that not only were the performers able to answer some of her questions, but then other audience members asked her what information she had gleaned from them - so a lovely organic process of gossip/rumour was begun.
The space. Well just look at the pics on the website, absolutely amazing. with the layout of the old rooms still marked on the floors and the crumbly bricks...mmmmm... It was really exciting at the beginning of the evening when some students turned up outside the site; I asked if they were there for the exhibition and they told me they used to live in the old hotel! So I invited them up and they looked around the space, tracing out the positions of their old rooms etc. It was exactly what the piece was all about. The performers watched them closely! Sadly they couldn't be convinced to stay for the performance.
The text. I was really pleased with how the performers brought the text to life and made their own stories out of it. I hope the text will be the vehicle for developing the stories further in my collaborative work for 070707 Upstage festival (see news and events on my website). This time, however, I want to expand the text to include imagery as well as words, and perhaps use my website as a 'script' so it can be constantly in flux rather than a static object.
Enough for now. More retrospective thoughts when I come back from my camping trip and am all relaxed!
phew, what an adventure. Having spent all of saturday saying to myself "i'm never doing this again. No really Cherry, never do this again, don't do it to yourself!" I have spent the time since saying "that was great, let's do it again".
It was nerve-racking and incredibly hard work, but we pulled it off and "the old hotel" went without a hitch (more or less) - although that's not to say i would do exactly the same again - so many interesting problems and ideas raised... where to start...?
First, the performers. They did their jobs perfectly. It was really interesting to see the difference in the two pairs (Rich and Jonny (A&B) and Ming and Mel (B&C)), as they had rehearsed separately and gone about it in two completely different ways. Rich and Jonny had worked very quickly, getting through the entire text once or twice in every rehearsal. They came off the book later in the week, but had gone much deeper into the thoughts behind the words and how they might use/subvert these. Because of this they were able to be very flexible with audience intervention and general presence/noise. Mel and Ming, on the other hand, worked through each scene much more slowly and thoroughly and focussed on accuracy rather than flexibility. The result on their side was a quieter more crafted approach to the scenes, which seemed to draw the audiences just as effectively as Rich and Jonny's energetic approach. I hope I will be able to work with Mel and Jonny for the next stage of this project too, so we can keep building on what we have rather than starting from scratch again (Rich and Ming will be working on their own performances in July).
The audience. Something you can never quite predict. How interesting to see how people's reactions changed over the course of the night. At first people listened intently, but by the 4th installment (there were 15 'scenes' spread across 90mins with 3-4 minute gaps between each), they started to realise that their full attention was neither necessary nor expected and began to drift off into groups, just catching bits here and there. Some parts went completely unnoticed - just a conversation amongst the crowd, others had people shushing and straining to hear. One thing that was common to every part was that as soon as a 'performance' was recognised, the audience drew back to a 'respectful' distance - and then complained that they couldn't hear!!! One brave audience member asked me if she could ask the performers questions, I said 'of course' and she walked straight into the middle of a conversation between rich and jonny. What was really wonderful about this was that not only were the performers able to answer some of her questions, but then other audience members asked her what information she had gleaned from them - so a lovely organic process of gossip/rumour was begun.
The space. Well just look at the pics on the website, absolutely amazing. with the layout of the old rooms still marked on the floors and the crumbly bricks...mmmmm... It was really exciting at the beginning of the evening when some students turned up outside the site; I asked if they were there for the exhibition and they told me they used to live in the old hotel! So I invited them up and they looked around the space, tracing out the positions of their old rooms etc. It was exactly what the piece was all about. The performers watched them closely! Sadly they couldn't be convinced to stay for the performance.
The text. I was really pleased with how the performers brought the text to life and made their own stories out of it. I hope the text will be the vehicle for developing the stories further in my collaborative work for 070707 Upstage festival (see news and events on my website). This time, however, I want to expand the text to include imagery as well as words, and perhaps use my website as a 'script' so it can be constantly in flux rather than a static object.
Enough for now. More retrospective thoughts when I come back from my camping trip and am all relaxed!
Tuesday, April 17, 2007
oh, it's such a hard life
rehearsals for 'the old hotel' (my performance piece for the sitelines exhibition) began last friday with a picnic on the south bank and a session of gossip in waterloo station. Mel and Ming are working as a pair - so i saw them for a long session on friday - and Rich and Jonny met with me on sunday. i am really excited about the way its all going. the dynamic in each of the pairs is completely different, it's really interesting what can happen with one text. was also fun to see how people on the south bank (see pic of jonny and rich below with woman watching in background) and in waterloo station, reacted to what we were doing. Mel and Ming rehearsed with me on site last night and i will be doing the same with rich and jonny tonight. Its exhausting, but the beautiful weather helps to keep everyone's spirits up.
i love my actors, they are all wonderful. I am, of course, terrified about saturday night, but at least i know that they will put everything they can into it, i just hope i can support the hard work they are doing - it's tough when you are not an actor yourself.
in the meantime, i've put more stuff on the website, and will do so again on thursday or friday. and here are some pics from our first rehearsals:
rehearsals for 'the old hotel' (my performance piece for the sitelines exhibition) began last friday with a picnic on the south bank and a session of gossip in waterloo station. Mel and Ming are working as a pair - so i saw them for a long session on friday - and Rich and Jonny met with me on sunday. i am really excited about the way its all going. the dynamic in each of the pairs is completely different, it's really interesting what can happen with one text. was also fun to see how people on the south bank (see pic of jonny and rich below with woman watching in background) and in waterloo station, reacted to what we were doing. Mel and Ming rehearsed with me on site last night and i will be doing the same with rich and jonny tonight. Its exhausting, but the beautiful weather helps to keep everyone's spirits up.
i love my actors, they are all wonderful. I am, of course, terrified about saturday night, but at least i know that they will put everything they can into it, i just hope i can support the hard work they are doing - it's tough when you are not an actor yourself.
in the meantime, i've put more stuff on the website, and will do so again on thursday or friday. and here are some pics from our first rehearsals:
Wednesday, April 11, 2007
i wish someone would write me letters like this!
“You seem the same as always, and being you, hate every minute of it. Don’t! Learn to say ‘Fuck You!’ to the world once in a while. You have every right to. Just stop thinking, worrying, looking over your shoulder, wondering, doubting, fearing, hurting, hoping for some easy way out, struggling, gasping, confusing, itching, scratching, mumbling, bumbling, grumbling, humbling, stumbling, rumbling, rambling, gambling, tumbling, scumbling, scrambling, hitching, hatching, bitching, moaning, groaning, honing, boning, horse-shitting, hair-splitting, nit-picking, piss-trickling, nose-sticking, ass-gouging, eyeball-poking, finger-pointing, alleyway-sneaking, long waiting, small stepping, evil-eying, back-scratching, searching, perching, besmirching, grinding grinding grinding away at yourself. Stop it and just DO.
From your description, and from what I know of your previous work and your ability, the work you are doing sounds very good. ‘Drawings—clear, clear-cut but crazy like machines, larger, bolder, real nonsense.’ That sounds wonderful—real nonsense. Do more. More nonsensical more crazy more machines, more breasts, penises, cunts, whatever—make them abound with nonsense. Try and tickle something inside you, your ‘weird humor.’ You belong in the most secret part of you. Don’t worry about cool, make your own uncool. Make your own, your own world. If you fear, make it work for you—draw and paint your fear and anxiety. And stop worrying about big, deep things such as ‘to decide on a purpose and way of life, a consistent approach to even some impossible end or even as imagined end.’ You must practice being stupid, dumb, unthinking, empty. Then you will be able to DO! I have much confidence in you and even though you are tormenting yourself, the work you do is very good. Try to do some BAD work. The worst you can think of and see what happens but mainly relax and let everything go to hell. You are not responsible for the world—you are only responsible for your work, so do it. And don’t think that your work has to conform to any idea or flavor. It can be anything you want it to be. But if life would be easier for you if you stopped working then stop. Don’t punish yourself. However, I think that it is so deeply engrained in you that it would be easier to DO.”
—letter from Sol Lewitt to Eva Hesse, c. 1964/1965 when she was living in Kettwig, Germany, with her marriage failing and creative spirit debilitated
Tuesday, April 03, 2007
at last
the website is up: www.cherrytruluck.co.uk/sitelines.html
still a few technical glitches to iron out and lots of info to add, but it's there, there are a few things to look at and after the easter weekend there will be a few more!
I have finished writing the text for my performance piece and now just have 10 days or so whilst the actors learn their lines. rehearsals begin the week before the exhibition. Was really worried as writing it has been a really stressful experience and i was too scared to show it to anyone before i gave it to the actors, but have had a really encouraging e-mail from Ming, which has cheered me up no end and got me all excited about it again.
Now am beginning to look at my research paper again. Am going to post my last draft on my website and would appreciate any comments etc. Have been looking recently at ways that people create web-based performances outside of the framework of 'art' or 'theatre' - such as www.justin.tv, as well as ways in which the internet is used in conjunction with other technologies to create a more interactive/physical experience of cyber-performance - e.g. http://www.diggriver.com - a community news site which texts stories to your mobile and flash mob actions - http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=2228162337. All suggestions welcome.
Finally have been building these crazy little models for a bit of pocket money (last paid job before i become a full-time scrounger). They are so cute, had to post a picture:
the website is up: www.cherrytruluck.co.uk/sitelines.html
still a few technical glitches to iron out and lots of info to add, but it's there, there are a few things to look at and after the easter weekend there will be a few more!
I have finished writing the text for my performance piece and now just have 10 days or so whilst the actors learn their lines. rehearsals begin the week before the exhibition. Was really worried as writing it has been a really stressful experience and i was too scared to show it to anyone before i gave it to the actors, but have had a really encouraging e-mail from Ming, which has cheered me up no end and got me all excited about it again.
Now am beginning to look at my research paper again. Am going to post my last draft on my website and would appreciate any comments etc. Have been looking recently at ways that people create web-based performances outside of the framework of 'art' or 'theatre' - such as www.justin.tv, as well as ways in which the internet is used in conjunction with other technologies to create a more interactive/physical experience of cyber-performance - e.g. http://www.diggriver.com - a community news site which texts stories to your mobile and flash mob actions - http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=2228162337. All suggestions welcome.
Finally have been building these crazy little models for a bit of pocket money (last paid job before i become a full-time scrounger). They are so cute, had to post a picture:
Wednesday, March 28, 2007
sitelines
its full steam ahead on this exhibition, i have four actors and am really excited about it. the piece has become very site specific - the site itself is fantastic. there's been loads of issues to deal with in terms of organising the exhibition, but i think it is working itself out. I plan to get the website up and running this weekend: www.cherrytruluck.co.uk
Its been a stressful term as far as available money and time are concerned and i am really sorry that i haven't been able to support everyone else's work, but from now on I will be much better. I have taken a whacking great loan out (which i will no doubt regret later!) and from now until September will only be working one day a week except for the odd little bit of freelance work. Other than that i will be fully committed to the course and will be around a lot more. In September I will win the lottery and set up a grant-giving fund for poor MA students!
see you all at the TBW private view on Friday night.
its full steam ahead on this exhibition, i have four actors and am really excited about it. the piece has become very site specific - the site itself is fantastic. there's been loads of issues to deal with in terms of organising the exhibition, but i think it is working itself out. I plan to get the website up and running this weekend: www.cherrytruluck.co.uk
Its been a stressful term as far as available money and time are concerned and i am really sorry that i haven't been able to support everyone else's work, but from now on I will be much better. I have taken a whacking great loan out (which i will no doubt regret later!) and from now until September will only be working one day a week except for the odd little bit of freelance work. Other than that i will be fully committed to the course and will be around a lot more. In September I will win the lottery and set up a grant-giving fund for poor MA students!
see you all at the TBW private view on Friday night.
Wednesday, February 28, 2007
by the way...
have been working on my own project too... at last have managed to find some time - unfortunately it meant quitting my main job, so now am stony broke and have to move out of my very convenient house-sitting arrangement in ladbroke grove. so back to brighton and those hideous train fares, eek.
so i'm doing this 'show' at the end of march in a building site in hammersmith. i'm really excited about it. it's going to be at about the same time as the interim show and will link to the website i am building for that (i'm not going to be physically present at the interim show, but my website will go live at the same time - am using it more as a deadline than an actual show). Anyway, the one in hammersmith... it's going to be a group exhibition with two painters and maybe a video artist, so i don't want to do a very theatre-y performance thing. So its going to be quiet a subtle intervention-type thing and i'm going to use bluetooth and mobile phones to continue this idea about fragments of stories and dream/memory spaces. the exhibition is a one-night only thing, which suits me, so am just waiting for a definite date and then i will let you know.
in the meantime am trying to organise a seminar from these people - please check them out: http://www.avatarbodycollision.org/ and http://www.creative-catalyst.com/
have been working on my own project too... at last have managed to find some time - unfortunately it meant quitting my main job, so now am stony broke and have to move out of my very convenient house-sitting arrangement in ladbroke grove. so back to brighton and those hideous train fares, eek.
so i'm doing this 'show' at the end of march in a building site in hammersmith. i'm really excited about it. it's going to be at about the same time as the interim show and will link to the website i am building for that (i'm not going to be physically present at the interim show, but my website will go live at the same time - am using it more as a deadline than an actual show). Anyway, the one in hammersmith... it's going to be a group exhibition with two painters and maybe a video artist, so i don't want to do a very theatre-y performance thing. So its going to be quiet a subtle intervention-type thing and i'm going to use bluetooth and mobile phones to continue this idea about fragments of stories and dream/memory spaces. the exhibition is a one-night only thing, which suits me, so am just waiting for a definite date and then i will let you know.
in the meantime am trying to organise a seminar from these people - please check them out: http://www.avatarbodycollision.org/ and http://www.creative-catalyst.com/
Tuesday, February 27, 2007
two storm wood and other ventures
wow, i haven't blogged for ages, how lax of me. Actually, i haven't even written a thank you letter to my grandad for my christmas present, that's how busy i've been! I've gone straight to the bottom of his favourite grandchildren list. Am going to write a grovelly letter, just as soon as i've finished this blog... hmmm... not sure if my priorities are quite right there...
so thanks for the huge support for the play! only kidding, i know how it is - i've been equally crap in supporting VLP in general recently. Anyway, it went ok. Bit weird, we got a new director 4 days before opening (long political story) and half my set got scrapped, so although it looked ok, it didn't really make any sense. My friends who came to see it assured me this didn't matter, that they thought it looked cool anyway and that they probably wouldn't have been that influenced by the design concept anyway, which made me realise just how futile my job is! Hours of obsessing over how to achieve my vision of oversize children's play-blocks which doubled as packing boxes were clearly well spent, and my genuine horror of creating a black box space with a single 'dramatic' focal point was realised. But such is life, these things happen. Overall the play - which, by the way, was genuinely a really wonderful piece of writing - was well received and got a pretty decent write up in the Daily Mail. Lets just hope it transfers somewhere and i get to redesign it.
pictures:
wow, i haven't blogged for ages, how lax of me. Actually, i haven't even written a thank you letter to my grandad for my christmas present, that's how busy i've been! I've gone straight to the bottom of his favourite grandchildren list. Am going to write a grovelly letter, just as soon as i've finished this blog... hmmm... not sure if my priorities are quite right there...
so thanks for the huge support for the play! only kidding, i know how it is - i've been equally crap in supporting VLP in general recently. Anyway, it went ok. Bit weird, we got a new director 4 days before opening (long political story) and half my set got scrapped, so although it looked ok, it didn't really make any sense. My friends who came to see it assured me this didn't matter, that they thought it looked cool anyway and that they probably wouldn't have been that influenced by the design concept anyway, which made me realise just how futile my job is! Hours of obsessing over how to achieve my vision of oversize children's play-blocks which doubled as packing boxes were clearly well spent, and my genuine horror of creating a black box space with a single 'dramatic' focal point was realised. But such is life, these things happen. Overall the play - which, by the way, was genuinely a really wonderful piece of writing - was well received and got a pretty decent write up in the Daily Mail. Lets just hope it transfers somewhere and i get to redesign it.
pictures:
Tuesday, January 30, 2007
eeeeeeeeeeeeeeee
everthing is 300 miles per hour at the moment, my (very organised but very annoying) calendar on my phone beeps at me every 5 minutes to tell me i should be somewhere else. But its great (except for the lack of sleep). Am loving working with Shotgun, have made the scary decision to have quite a minimal set, which is great if it works, but otherwise looks like i didn't do much work. There's some nice graphics going on and a big black tree, but otherwise its just giant building blocks and a seventies sofa. Am not going to show you any design images before the show - as i hope you'll all come and see it, but here's the flyer, to give you a taster:
my own work is on the back burner, but ever-present in the recesses of my mind... thinking lots about text and layers and stories... anyway, not enough to tell you about at the moment. exciting news of the day is that (through Shotgun) I went to meet a young theatre designer called David Farley (http://www.clarevidalhall.co.uk/clients/david_farley/cv.htm) this morning. He went through my designs with me and we chatted about his work, it was really fun. Nice to see someone actually surviving quite reasonably in this field (he has a studio in Fitzrovia - lovely)! I should have googled him before my visit, but my phone didn't bleep me early enough and i ran out of time, but have checked him out since, he has done some nice stuff, check out this interview with him - http://www.sheffieldtheatres.co.uk/education/productions/macbeth/setdesign.shtml - mmm, I do like a bit of Louise Bourgeois.
everthing is 300 miles per hour at the moment, my (very organised but very annoying) calendar on my phone beeps at me every 5 minutes to tell me i should be somewhere else. But its great (except for the lack of sleep). Am loving working with Shotgun, have made the scary decision to have quite a minimal set, which is great if it works, but otherwise looks like i didn't do much work. There's some nice graphics going on and a big black tree, but otherwise its just giant building blocks and a seventies sofa. Am not going to show you any design images before the show - as i hope you'll all come and see it, but here's the flyer, to give you a taster:
my own work is on the back burner, but ever-present in the recesses of my mind... thinking lots about text and layers and stories... anyway, not enough to tell you about at the moment. exciting news of the day is that (through Shotgun) I went to meet a young theatre designer called David Farley (http://www.clarevidalhall.co.uk/clients/david_farley/cv.htm) this morning. He went through my designs with me and we chatted about his work, it was really fun. Nice to see someone actually surviving quite reasonably in this field (he has a studio in Fitzrovia - lovely)! I should have googled him before my visit, but my phone didn't bleep me early enough and i ran out of time, but have checked him out since, he has done some nice stuff, check out this interview with him - http://www.sheffieldtheatres.co.uk/education/productions/macbeth/setdesign.shtml - mmm, I do like a bit of Louise Bourgeois.
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