All the world’s a stage and we merely players supporting one another.
The day started with each and every one of us stating our access needs in as minute a detail as we could recall. I think there is something in that. To state to all and sundry the best way each soul present can access the information shared. Therein lies the rainbow of humanity; graduating shades of needs; each different yet each relatable to our own experience. This is key, to realise we are each microcosms of the other, a virtual rainbow of human experience, in which exists a space of acceptance, of recognition. Of ‘Hey, I know you’!
And… Breathe…
There was talk of principles, of stretching boundaries to collaborate with fellow masters, of taking ultimate responsibility of personal responses to other’s offering
Penetration
Desire
A movement from objects of desire to subjects of desire – a small shift in word but a huge one in concept.
Here we spoke of the carving out of ‘Desire Lines’ to our art.
You know, when you walk a track to come upon a corner and you see a shorter route beaten into the undergrowth; one that cuts the curve to the next saving many treads of boot?
There exists a driving force.
Matt ‘Shillie’ Shillcock shared with us his practise of ritual embodiment of desire. Using the Sigil Wheel in a form of ceremony he has been able to bind his passage through life to the unique physical movement used, celebrating it in dance.
Lorcan, continuing the male way-finding through our fledgling process, went next. He spoke of his many achievements in performance, film and dance; a self assured artist in painting, media, expression. The words with which to express them are lucid, clear and much more skilful than personally realised.
Pony held their hand up here and spoke of understanding solitude and the malleability of character found through this. Their questioning of self led to exploration through art practise to a kind of self determination in which gender, prejudice and authority was revealed in their very character. Utilising sound and visual media, they busted parameters without invitation nor plan yet found them both waiting…
Kirsty Martinsen spoke of her former identity as a prize-winning artist. One who lost herself through the banal course of traditional study, finding herself again in the city of New York where she secured secondment in her art form. Once diagnosed with MS, she returned reluctantly to Australia and ‘slowly imploded’. Her choice of medium, water colour, suffered her reduced capability greatly and so she gave up any hope of representing her chosen form of art again. Recently, in a surprise twist of events, performance has been taken up and she has acknowledged the great tool her wheel-chair is in expressing her desire. She has found her art again.
A quote she shared today struck a particularly poignant note with me – ‘the more you restrict, the more you create’. And how.
Hayley, as a recent addition to these offerings came next. A play write and actor, she desires to branch out from traditional characters to those in otherworldly situations. In search of the ultimate anti hero, her immersion in the process is complete. She lives that reality for the writing time. She sees herself as having a lack of preciousness; someone malleable by her own body and discovery of self. She went on here to reference the Nativity scene from the bible along with the gendered rights prevalent in the depiction.
Gaelle Sobott came next. A writer/producer not traditionally learned but self taught, has found herself driven by degrees of violence and by her remarkable heritage of unionism. Faith has been bestowed via her life in southern Africa, Botswana.
Now she is researching the issue of how we value human life, who is born and who is not born.
Cinzia spoke of her negotiation through dance. Of Mums and Babies and disability. As a perfomer and collaborative artist, improvisation is key. Riding the creative process with video work and voice work, she questions the separation with reality, of dancing for approval. In moving to a space of unknowing, there is a questioning of her motivation.
Oneness is a space she recognises together with space and ceremony, of ritual and light weaving.
Later in the evening most of us attended the opening of the Adelaide Film Festival where a daring Guinness Book of World Records attempt was made using phones for a VR experience. However technology being technology, many stop starts were had. Prosecco is clouding my memory now (artists and free drinks are a legendary mix) but I think it was achieved in the end.
We saw a brilliantly made pilot for a ABC series called, ironically enough, ‘Fucking Adelaide’.
I did an admirable attempt (even if I do say so myself) at home-coming butterfly, grinning from ear to ear, flitting from table to table, reuniting with my peeps and loving every second of it.
