performance – Creative & dance journal

Residuals #2 – Dartington

On March 17 at the Shippon Artists Studios, Dartington Estate, Devon, there was the second residuals performance – Residuals #2. A co-created charcoal drawing was produced as well as a performance by its four artists – which included me.

Residuals #1: drawings

Beside the dance and movement making of the Residuals #1 performance, it created a large charcoal drawing about 3 metres by 1.5 metres in size. There were also numerous photographs made by my co-creator John Hazel and me of its surface during and after the performance.

Residuals #1: performance

I dived into the surface of the paper. Beneath me, carbon residuals (charcoal) assisted my passage as I slide across the white paper, parting the material and marking the paper. John Hazel who was co-creating the charcoal drawing with me, followed by stepping and drawing with his shod foot. The dance studio at the Old Fire Station, Oxford was our performance venue for this ‘drawing-dance’ on Tuesday 16 January 2024.

Visit to Statolit performance by artist Adèle Essle Zeiss

I visited the contemporary art gallery Moderna Museet in Malmö, Sweden on August 26, to watch ‘Statolit’ a performance created by artist Adèle Essle Zeiss. Suspension and balance (arrested movement giving stillness) was presented in a gallery setting.

Remembering Hugo Demartini, artist

On 10 February 2022, I stood in University Parks, Oxford with 100 small sticks and paper slips between my cupped hands. Raising my hands upward, the sticks and paper were lofted into the air. As they were rising they slowed until, for a moment, they were suspended, neither rising nor falling – a cloud of sticks before me, about to scatter and return earthward in a shower.

Spring Awakening #HeadstandChallenge

Oxford City Council (as Dancin’ Oxford) asked for contributions to its Spring Awakening project. Dancers contribute video clips of themselves dancing which are edited into a final film for digital distribution. A headstand seemed to summon-up the period in which we were living – the world turned upside down by Coronavirus!