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Breath
This morning I feel the shortness of breath that comes with anger at and despair of humans’ unfeeling actions. I need the massage of breath, immersion into the present, into feeling. Prepare the space and the soundtrack. Lay the yoga mat and play Jon Hopkins’ musical cycle Ritual. It follows a seasonal familiarity—repetitions with a…
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An update on writing the autobiography
I started writing my autobiography just over a year ago. Maybe I’m halfway. This time last week I was feeling overwhelmed, with chronology and what to include or not. Today, after a few breakthrough days, I realise it is the same as making a dance work (but longer). There is the engrossing research, the accumulation…
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#Score for walking
1 August 2024 Torrens Weir to Port Road, Adelaide (3.4 kms) I turned over to August in my “Unlikely Destinations” calendar to find “House on fire”— homes carved into a sandstone cliff in Mule Canyon, Utah. The stone looks like flames, but petrified. So I set a score for today’s walk: #Score for…
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Sewing Machine
Yesterday I opened my mother’s sewing machine. The last time I did that was about fourteen months ago when, after painstakingly referring to the English/French 1980’s-something instruction book to navigate my way to operation, I found it was in need of repair. Something was out of alignment, needles breaking on the steel plate. I recall…
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Cabin Fever returns
After four years I’m bringing back my site specific solo performance, Cabin Fever. When covid arrived just at the end of my 2020 season at Adelaide Fringe, I thought I would never again be able to perform this very intimate exchange for eight bodies (plus mine) inside a cosy 1979 Windsor caravan. But now that…
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Walking into writing
Walking into writing Taking my mind out into the world Dropping into rhythms Then letting a detail interrupt that Taking time Enlarging the present moment Sunlight on shell glitter Unblinking search for surface breach Dog nose on hand Walking with family Ancestors, community World patterns, tides The progress is populated with footprints Animal, human,…
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Solo hike
On Friday 27 November I set off on a solo hike cross country on Björkö, Sweden. I wired myself up for sound over the 90 minutes I was walking. This is an edit of the audio down to 19 minutes, with a few still images here and there. Solo hike
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Experiment #34
Hey There (Heather) Kapplow gave us a provocation this morning called Experiment #34. She had adapted it for Björkö from “Synchronized Travel” in The Lonely Planet Guide to Experimental Travel (Lonely Planet Publications 2005). Our group of seven set our alarms for one hour and headed off alone. There were ten instructions to “develop an…
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Björkö residency begins
23 October 2023 Björkö I’m back in Sweden, 11 years on. Four days of planes, trains, buses, and 30 odd kilometres on foot to arrive at Björkö-Arholma skola, my home for the next two weeks. Ami is waiting on the roadside when my bus pulls in and we seal the moment with a selfie. It…
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The Improvisor’s Podcast
Kevin Jeynes and Neil Thomas, two Melbourne-based improvisors, have created a series of interviews with improvisors called “The Improvisor’s Podcast.” I was honoured to be asked to contribute #4 https://youtu.be/Ra8Xu2x9GY0 A great collection of conversations with improvisation artists working across a range of mediums. Follow this fantastic archive …
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Walking as Practice
In October 2023 I will be one of a number of international artists selected for the “Walking As Practice” residency on Björkö, an island in the Northern Stockholm Archipelago, Sweden. The ‘Walking As Practice’ residency is curated by Anna Viola Hallberg & Ami Skånberg under the auspices of BKN, a not for profit organisation. Established…
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Yield—Dance.Focus commission from Dance Hub SA
My latest screendance “Yield” has just premiered as part of Dance Hub SA’s Dance.Focus commission for 2022. http://bit.ly/DHSAYouTube About Yield: Yield, is inspired in title by Tara June Winch’s novel “The Yield” in which she describes ‘yield’ or ‘baayanha’ as “the things you give to, the movement, the space between things.” This project honours the…
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Gathering
Gathering Here is a collection of the danced/spoken/filmed interactions I had with some dancers with connections to Australian Dance Theatre, while on my residency there in June 2021. Thanks to Aidan Munn, Lisa Heaven, Peter Sheedy, Alison Currie, Sarah Munn, Carol Wellman Kelly and Elizabeth Cameron Dalman. Original compositions by Stuart Day and other music…
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X — Dance Hub SA: live-streamed improvised event
Tomorrow at 4pm (ACST) Dance Hub goes live with “X” —the first of four interdisciplinary improvised events. Watch here X is a performed improvised event and the breeding ground of Dance and Music experimentation extending the lineage of luminaries Merce Cunningham and John Cage using chance and randomness as creative tools. At the outset of…
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End of Residency Showings
Alex, one of the new people I met at my open classes, asked “What do you do as an artist in residence?” A residency is a haven—time and space to wonder, wander, converse, consider… It is time away from the independent artist finances hunt and a studio space in which to gather community, to…
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Week 5 into 6
Not so many words this entry…all the energy into the editing of the many interactions (live and online) in preparation for the end of residency showing this coming Thursday 1st July 2021. But here’s a taster of that… This residency has been kindly supported by Australian Dance Theatre’s Artist in Residence/ICC Program.
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Week 4 — editing/transcribing
I began the editing process of the bodies in the void (local dancers filmed in the blacked out space in the Tanya Liedtke studio) and transcribing the video edited sequence onto the live body. Stuart Day is working with their audio interviews to create a soundscape. Aidan Munn has been my in-studio colleague in this…
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Week 3 — Gathering
Local community Having access to a live studio space (with excellent internet speed!) has meant I have been able to gather a community to share a screen/dance practice. In addition to 14 dance practitioners (7 live in the studio, and 7 via the “Zoomasphere”) there has been another 15 coming to the classes I have…
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Week 2 merging into 3
A big 2nd week blurring into the 3rd a mix of live shoots (Aidan Munn, Alison Currie, Elizabeth Cameron Dalman) and virtual conversations/creative exchanges (Emma Wilson (Qld), Simon Ellis (UK), and Zoë Dunwoodie (SA but in Perth) discussions verbal and physical.. How to get close from a distance? Reminders about sensation and imagination Choreographing connection…
