Rosie Cooper

In the Belly of the Whale (Act III), Montehermoso, 2 March - 17 June 2012

noreply@blogger.com (Rosie Cooper) — Tue, 28 Feb 2012 15:31:00 +0000

Image: Fountainhead, Donna Huddleston, 2011

Montehermoso
C/ Fray Zacarías Martínez, 2
Vitoria-Gasteiz
Spain

The Cast

Jesse Ash and Cally Spooner // Edwina Ashton // Côme Ciment // Winnie Cott // Jess Flood-Paddock // Anthea Hamilton // Donna Huddleston // Germaine Kruip // Jacopo Miliani

And featuring Orson Welles: The One Man Band, by Vassili Silovic and Oja Kodar

Curated by Rosie Cooper and Ariella Yedgar

Scene

You are entering an exhibition concerned with rehearsal and its related notions of version, repetition and failure. As a 'controlled form of chaos' or 'unfinalised potential', the works brought together here create a psychological space that constantly denies the viewer a final conclusion.

When used as a strategy, the rehearsal foregrounds that which takes place on the periphery and that may be obscured by presenting a polished piece - principally, the untidy process of thought and consideration. Similarly, this show shines the spotlight away from the finished product and onto the open-ended, experimental, hidden or doubtful.

The majority of works have been commissioned, or adapted, especially for the exhibition, and many are highly ambitious in scale and complexity, including a 25-metre long canvas sky housing a giant oyster by Jess Flood-Paddock, and Icecreams, a series of metal and rope screens occupying the gallery's 6 metre-high arches by Anthea Hamilton. Adam Chodzko has recorded 'actors' working silently on stage and pressed the material into a vinyl record that is played throughout the space; Come Ciment imagines a future version of this exhibition that takes place underwater in 2059; and Donna Huddleston's Smoke Garden comprises a series of objects made in preparation for a performance about women, featuring the musical triangle. On the opening night, Jacopo Miliani will present Actors, a work for two performers standing too far apart to be heard at once. As well as the works contained within the gallery, the exhibition features a radio programme in three parts by Jesse Ash and Cally Spooner.

The title of the show takes inspiration from Orson Welles´s lifelong obsession with Moby Dick, of which he directed and appeared in at least three different adaptations - in a play about a rehearsal of a stage adaptation of the novel - and twice in related, and uncompleted, film projects.

´In the Belly of the Whale (Act III)' follows two previous versions (or rehearsals) of the project: a four-person exhibition in London, titled 'In the Belly of the Whale', and an advertisement for a future exhibition that includes a fantasy cast and appeared in Monaco magazine (both 2011).

The Space

It is said that Welles considered the theatre hall of his play to be the belly of the whale in which the actors are unwittingly trapped, and for this exhibition, the distinctive and vast gallery space of Montehermoso - the former water tank for the city - becomes the metaphorical belly of the whale: its columns and arches reminiscent of a ribcage and the proscenium arches suggesting a traditional theatre. It is a framework for a show featuring works of film, sound, performance, installation and sculpture.

Events

Jesse Ash and Cally Spooner's Moveable Column will be broadcast live on Resonance FM (www.resonancefm.com) at the following times:

Tuesday 3 April, 20:00-21:00

Tuesday 15 May, 20:00-21:00

Tuesday 12 June, 20:00-21:00

Jacopo Miliani's Actors will be performed once at the beginning of the exhibition, at 21:00 on 2 March at Montehermoso, and once at the end.

Curtain

A Darkness More Than Night, QUAD Gallery, 11 November 2011 - 29 January 2012

noreply@blogger.com (Rosie Cooper) — Thu, 20 Oct 2011 19:24:00 +0000

Image: Mike Cooter, Scarlet Street, 2006/2011, Courtesy the Kirk Collection.

Thom Andersen /// Chris Burden /// Mike Cooter /// John Divola /// Douglas Gordon /// Johan Grimonprez /// David Noonan /// Hadrian Pigott /// Laure Prouvost /// Fergal Stapleton /// Sturtevant /// Nicole Wermers /// Cerith Wyn Evans

QUAD Gallery
Derby, UK

Curated by Ariella Yedgar and Rosie Cooper

'A Darkness More Than Night' explores contemporary art through 'noir', a genre most readily associated with stylish Hollywood crime dramas of the 1940s and 50s, yet whose precursors date back through nineteenth century to Greek tragedy. Taking a forensic approach, the exhibition considers the aesthetics and mood of noir, and describes them through some of its key components, such as Darkness and Scene of the Crime. Another major noir element is the MacGuffin, a term attributed to Alfred Hitchcock for an object or idea that is pursued by characters throughout a film but that has little inherent value other than to drive the narrative forward. The exhibition features contributions by contemporary artists from across the world who work in a variety of media - including sculpture, installation, print and film.

further text and images below

Many of the themes that are central to film noir are universal: a troubled mind, a fruitless or baffling pursuit of an impossible goal, vice, deceit and the isolating effect of the city. Owing to these enduring impulses and to the stylish and modern aesthetic that are associated with noir, the genre has remained influential for successive generations of practitioners across the arts. Whereas current links between the genre and cinema, graphic novels, literature and television are readily apparent through 'neo-noir', 'A Darkness More Than Night' is the first exhibition to consider the relationship between contemporary art and noir.

The exhibition is accompanied by a booklet entitled 'Miscellany of Noir'.

Left to right: Mike Cooter, Poor Man´s Process, 2008; Sturtevant, Duchamp:Wanted, 1991 (behind Mike Cooter); David Noonan, Untitled, 2011; Johan Grimonprez, Double Take, 2009 (in blue screening room); Chris Burden, Gold Bullets, 2003.

Left to right: John Divola, Set Stills - Stairs, 2003; Hadrian Pigott, Instrument of Hygiene (case 3), 1995; Douglas Gordon, Blind James Cagney and Blind Ava Gardner, both 2004.

Chris Burden, Gold Bullets, 2003.

Douglas Gordon, Blind James Cagney, 2004.

John Divola, Set Stills - Stairs (2002).

Nicole Wermers, French Junkies no. 5, 2002.

Hadrian Pigott, Instrument of Hygiene (case 3), 1995.

Left to right: Mike Cooter, Scarlet Street 2006/2011; Johan Grimonprez, Double Take, 2009 (in blue room); Nicole Wermers, French Junkies no. 5, 2002.

Left to right: Nicole Wermers, French Junkies no. 11, 2002; Laure Prouvost, OWT, 2007.

Left to right: Sturtevant, Duchamp: Wanted, 1992; David Noonan, Untitled, 2011; Mike Cooter, Scarlet Street, 2006/2011.

Sturtevant, Duchamp: Wanted, 1992.

Johan Grimonprez, Double Take, 2009.

Laure Prouvost, OWT, 2007.

Cerith Wyn-Evans, Meanwhile... Across town, 2001.

Brian Dillon and Momus: In Conversation at the Swedenborg Society

noreply@blogger.com (Rosie Cooper) — Mon, 27 Jun 2011 12:00:00 +0000

A book presentation and conversation between Brian Dillon and Momus.

Monday, June 27 2011

The Swedenborg Society
20-21 Bloomsbury Way
London WC1A 2TH

Two new publications, Sanctuary by Brian Dillon and Solution 214-238: The Book of Japans by Momus, were launched at the Swedenborg Society. Both books are published by Sternberg Press.

Sanctuary is a fiction set in the ruins of a Modernist building on the outskirts of a city in Northern Europe. The structure, a Catholic seminary built in the 1960s and abandoned twenty years later, embodies the failure of certain ambitions: architectural, civic, and spiritual. But it is the site too of a more recent disappearance. A young artist, intent on exploring the complex and its history, has gone missing among the wreckage. Months later his lover visits the place, unsure what she is looking for, and finds herself drawn into the strange nexus of energies and memories that persist there. Sanctuary is a story about what survives - of bodies, ideas, objects and the artistic or literary terms that might describe them - in the wake of catastrophe.

Following the success of The Book of Scotlands, Momus has been commissioned to write another book as part of Inigo Niermann's Solution series. Solution Japan, or The Book of Japans, makes a case for the rehabilitation of the idea of the "far". We live in a time when difference and distance have been eroded and eradicated by globalization, the Internet, and cheap jet travel. The Book of Japans restores a sense of wonder - along with a plethora of imagination-triggering inaccuracies - by taking the reader on a trip not just through space but also time.

Brian Dillon was borin in Dublin in 1969. He is the UK editor of Cabinet magazine and AHRC Research Fellow in the Creative and Performing Arts at the University of Kent. He is the author of Tormented Hope: Nine Hypochondriac Lives (Penguin, 2009) and a memoir, In the Dark Room (Penguin, 2005). His writing appears regularly in such publications as frieze, Artforum, the Guardian, the London Review of Books, and the Wire. He lives in Canterbury.

Momus is the pseudonym of Scottish musician, artist, and writer Nick Currie. Born in Paisley, Scotland, in 1960, he has released twenty albums of pop music on independent labels like 4AD, Creation, and Cherry Red. He writes regularly about art, design, and culture for the New York Times, iD, frieze, Spike, and 032c. In addition to The Book of Scotlands, Momus has published a novel, The Book of Jokes (Dalkey Archive Press, 2009).

In the Belly of the Whale, Cartel Gallery

noreply@blogger.com (Rosie Cooper) — Sun, 08 May 2011 11:58:00 +0000

In the Belly of the Whale

Cartel

114-116 Amersham Vale (in the courtyard of the Old Police Station)

London SE14

Adam Chodzko /// Côme Ciment /// Anthea Hamilton /// Jacopo Miliani

Curated by Ariella Yedgar and Rosie Cooper

28 May - 16 July 2011

Wednesday - Saturday 12-4pm.

Late opening Friday 24 June 7-11pm.

Private View: 27 May 6:30pm - late

Moby Dick inspired a lifelong obsession in Orson Welles. So much so, that he directed and appeared in at least three different adaptations of the novel: once on stage and twice in film.

Welles's interpretations of Moby Dick included a 1955 play about a theatre company's rehearsal of the Melville story, which featured newcomers Patrick McGoohan, Joan Plowright and Kenneth Williams, and starred the director himself as Captain Ahab. It is said that Welles considered the theatre hall to be the belly of the whale, in which the actors are unwittingly trapped - much as, in the novel, the crew are caught on the ship. Soon after the theatre production finished its run, Welles shot, in two London theatres, a film that included additional cast members such as Christopher Lee. It has since been presumed lost. 16 years later, Welles made another attempt at his own film version, in which he played all the major parts. Some of this footage was edited into a movie posthumously but, at the time of writing, the film is unavailable for public viewing due to legal issues.

'In the Belly of the Whale' is a response to Welles's unremitting and ultimately unfinished project. It considers the theme of rehearsal and its related notions of incompleteness, version and repetition. The exhibition features new works by Adam Chodzko, Côme Ciment and Jacopo Miliani, a recent piece by Anthea Hamilton and contextual material.

Adam Chodzko has made a film for a damaged projector, set in a theatre, and objects for actors to use in rehearsal. Côme Ciment has articulated elements from Moby Dick and the exhibition's premise with different gestures that appear throughout the exhibition space.

Anthea Hamilton's airy room divider Untitled (Rope Divider) (2009/2011) is made predominantly of knotted rope - the technique for which was inspired by John Huston's film Moby Dick. A large metal ring acts as a portal between the real space of the exhibition and a possible space of fiction.

Working with found images of a theatrical origin, Jacopo Miliani imagines a casting for some of the secondary characters in Moby Dick.

'In the Belly of the Whale' is itself a rehearsal for a larger show that the curators are developing in parallel.

About the Artists:

Adam Chodzko

Chodzko works in a variety of media that have included performance, film, drawing and sculpture. His work is conceptual, and often lyrical and fantastical. Working directly with the people and places that surround him, Chodzko's art focuses on culture's edges, endings, displacements and disappearances. He has exhibited extensively, most recently at venues and exhibitions including: Tate St Ives, Cornwall; Museum d'Arte Moderna, Bologna; Athens Foundation, Athens; PS1, New York; Ikon Gallery, Birmingham; Kunstmuseum Luzern, Switzerland. In 2002 he received awards from the Paul Hamlyn Foundation, London, and the Foundation for Contemporary Art, New York.

Côme Ciment

Côme Ciment is one of the many identities of artist Olivier Castel, who makes work under a variety of different names, often collaged from those of other artists. Similarly, his art takes on - and re-imagines - a range of broad cultural references, including literature and art, with a characteristic lightness of touch and humorous approach. Previous exhibitions include 'Variety;, London (2011), and 'Ribbons: The Shape of an Exhibition', Auto Italia, London (2010), both solo shows; an intervention entitled 'The Fox is Concentrating, Trying to Make the Exhibition Disappear', for the Zabludowicz Collection, London (2011); 'Tableau Viavnt: A Wandering Retrospective', Prospect New Orleans, (2010); and 'How Large the World is in the Light of the Lamps', Curzon Soho Cinema, London (2008), in collaboration with Kazimierz Jankowski.

Anthea Hamilton

The physicality of bodies and objects are a source of pleasure for Anthea Hamilton. She combines disparate elements (music, films, images from men's magazines, rope, the silhouette of a woman's leg, a melon, a rubber mask of Bart Simpson, etc.) to uncanny effect in her work, which takes different forms, including installations, mobiles, films and paintings. Recent solo exhibitions include: 'Anthea Hamilton', IBID Projects, London (2009); 'Spaghetti Hoops', La Salle de bains, Lyon (2009); and Kusntverein Freiburg, Germany (2009). Recent group exhibitions include: 'Savage Messiah', Rob Tufnell at Sutton Lane, London (2011); 'Newspeak: British Art Now', Saatchi Gallery, London (2010), 'Wunderkammer', me Collectors Room, Berlin (2010); and 'Small Collections', Nottingham Contemporary, Nottingham (2009).

Jacopo Miliani

Through his interdisciplinary practice (installations, videos, collages, performances), Jacopo Miliani challenges the role of representation as a mimesis of reality and its placement in contemporary society. Using the subjectivity of the viewer in relation to mass culture, Jacopo reflects upon image and audience, often using his personal archive of quotations and found images in ambiguous ways to create a work that can only be 'completed' in the audience's mind. Recent exhibitions include 'Italian Wave', Artissima, Turin (2010); a screening in relation to the Derek Jarman retrospective at the Serpentine Gallery, London (2008). In 2009, he was granted the Platform Garanti International Residence Programme in Istanbul. He has also shown work at Villa Romana, Florence; FormContent, London; and has recently contributed to the International Performance Festival at Galeria Vermelho in Sao Paolo, Brazil.

About Cartel:

Cartel is an independent not-for-profit platform for curators in South East London. Launched in the summer of 2010, it showcases about six projects a year. Housed in a black shipping container, Cartel's programme is decided by a flexible consortium of international members.

For more information: cartel@cartelgallery.com

More Soup and Tart, Barbican Theatre

noreply@blogger.com (Rosie Cooper) — Thu, 03 Mar 2011 18:35:00 +0000

Laurie Anderson performing How to Yodel at Soup and Tart, the Kitchen Gallery, New York 1974. Image: Peter Moore.

More Soup and Tart was a sell-out evening in the Barbican's main Theatre on April 15th, held in the spirit of artist Jean Dupuy's legendary 1974-5 Soup and Tart events at the Kitchen Gallery in New York. Audiences were served a light meal of homemade soup and tart, which was followed by a 'menu' of contributions by around 30 practitioners including Charles Atlas, Matta-Clark, Hannah Wilke, Arthur Russell, Steve Reich and Richard Serra. Each contribution lasted no longer than 2 minutes.

This re-imagined version keeps the format of the original: 2 minute contributions in the form of film and live performance from 33 of the most interesting practitioners across dance, art, music and film. The line-up featured Christian Marclay, Martin Creed, Simon Bookish, Ryan Styles, Mark Aerial Waller, Tai Shani, William Cheshire, Tom Woolner, Penny Arcade, Jennifer Walshe, Edwina Ashton, Dog Kennel Hill Project, Vicki Bennett (People Like Us), Frauke Requardt, Mikhail Karikis, Rosemary Butcher, William Cobbing, Marcia Farquhar, Nicoletta Tiberini, Andrew Kotting, Sam Lee, Simon Vincenzi, Stewart Home, John Butcher, Tim Etchells, Lucy Beech & Edward Thomasson, Holly Slingsby, Marcia Farquhar, Jeremiah Day, Catalina Niculescu, Hilary Koob-Sassen, with a filmed contributions from Charles Atlas and Michael Clark. Live documentation by LuckyPDF.

Click this link for an amazing illustrated review of the evening by Amelia's Magazine.

See below for selected images of 'More Soup and Tart' (all images courtesy of Felix Clay)...

Audiences drinking soup before the performance begins

Mikhail Karikis, Introductions

Edwina Ashton, Lobster Song / Lobster Singing

Stewart Home, Spam Turned Upside Down

Nicoletta Tiberini, Sounding Poem

Ryan Styles, Profiles II

Vicki Bennett (People Like Us), 2'00" The Movie

Marcia Farquhar, Mothball

Simon Bookish, Dot Museum

Frauke Requhardt, Episode

Jeremiah Day, Untitled

Rosemary Butcher, One Island

Jennifer Walshe, G.L.O.R.I.

Holly Slingsby, Minotaur in a China Shop: Golden Calf Version

John Butcher, Pure Bristle

Lucy Beech & Edward Thomasson, 7 Year Itch

Tom Woolner, An Early Episode from the Life of Archimboldo

Penny Arcade, Homage to Hannah Wilke: Avant-garde denotes a time period, it is not a style.

Dog Kennel Hill Project, Death Scene 347

Sam Lee, Folk Song

Tai Shani, To Dream and Die in America - A Trailer

Tim Etchells, And Counting

Christian Marclay Smash Hits, 1991

Simon Vincenzi Naked Singularity (as part of Operation Infinity)

William Cobbing, Mobile Home

Laurie Anderson, Trisha Brown, Gordon Matta-Clark: Pioneers of the Downtown Scene, New York 1970s (Public Programme, Barbican Art Gallery)

noreply@blogger.com (Rosie Cooper) — Sat, 05 Feb 2011 14:56:00 +0000

Download a pdf of the events programme I have put together for Barbican Art Gallery's Laurie Anderson, Trisha Brown, Gordon Matta-Clark: Pioneers of the Downtown Scene, New York 1970s here (right hand side of the main exhibition page).

Events include an evening with Cafe Oto, a panel discussion entitled On and Off Stage: Experimental Theatre and Visual Art Performance featuring Catherine Wood, Joe Kelleher, Bruce McLean and Tai Shani, a new commission from Athanasios Argianas, LUX artist film night, an evening of duets with a contribution from Aura Satz, a TV studio from LuckyPDF TV, a night of Sound and Words with performance from Rachel Cattle and Michael Horowitz, a discussion on artists, cities and subcultures with Iain Sinclair, Richard Grayson and Anthony Gross, dinners with Companis and DesignMarketo, and nights organised by the Architecture Foundation and Rational Rec.

Songs of the Swamp, Kunsthalle Exnergasse, Vienna

noreply@blogger.com (Rosie Cooper) — Mon, 10 Jan 2011 19:16:00 +0000

Paula Kane Above the Forest at the Edge of the Lake, Oil on Canvas, 2006

Songs of the Swamp

Kunsthalle Exnergasse, WUK, Vienna

28 January - 3 March 2011

Anthony Auerbach /// Eric Beltran & Jorge Satorre /// Leah Carvell // Hannah Collins /// Verity Combe /// Sophie Cundale /// Stephen Danzig // Etcétera… /// Doug Fishbone /// Christian Graupner /// Sharon Green /// Alex Hamilton /// Claire Hooper /// Paula Kane /// Lisa Louttit /// Michaela Math /// Melissa Moore /// Nomos /// John Russell /// Tim Spooner /// Eva Stenram /// Joulia Strauss /// Myriam Thyes /// Bela Weiner

Songs of the Swamp presents an array of international artists whose works represent, invent, question, or deploy systems. The context is the failure of multiple systems – national, theatrical, financial, market, web.

Songs of the Swamp seeks a new aesthetic taxonomy of systems: their actors and their dynamics, their becoming, ascendancy and decay. Songs of the Swamp asks, in making an exhibition – an experiment in the creation of new meaning – can we capture the interplay between multiple systems as a story?

A swamp is prey to drainage, it stands in narrative limbo. It can become a garden, a desert, a body.

Accepting his Nobel Peace prize for pure potential in 2009, Barack Obama quotes J.F.K.:

“Let us focus… on a gradual evolution in human institutions”.
Evolution happens without fluidity: punctuated equilibrium. The steady sputter of genetic and technical errors keeps traction on the ancestral speed of change. But cataclysmic punctuations of the norm create a slickness on which only rare and radical glitches – like mammals with flippers – can grip. Those less lucky in their errors can only hope that War, Hunger and Warming herald a cataclysmic supercession: a new ecology of built systems that is not reliant on extreme catastrophe to create real change.

The progatonist here is a worm-like structure that winds through the Kunsthalle Exnergasse, ‘drawn’ from thin strips of steel. Contained within the gut-strings of the worm are a number of video works in varying stages of dissection.

Outside the ‘worm’, systems find a space within the ‘swamp’: identity and nationhood, myth making, literacy and interpretation, spatial alterity, time / scale, memory and industry; the body.

Worm is the syntactical seeking of a story for itself in the ecology of the exhibition.

Curated by Hilary Koob-Sassen, with Rosie Cooper.

Guide Two: New work for 176 Gallery's 'Testing Ground' project

noreply@blogger.com (Rosie Cooper) — Mon, 10 Jan 2011 19:13:00 +0000

TESTING GROUND

176 Gallery

Saturday 29 - Sunday 30 January, 11am-7pm
Preview Friday 28 January, 6-10pm

This year’s collaboration between students from the MFA Curating at Goldsmiths College and the MA Curating Contemporary Art at Royal College of Art seeks to make visible the processes involved in exhibition-making and its accompanying notions of scale and duration. This changing display of works from the Zabludowicz Collection will be punctuated by a programme of artists’ commissions and interventions.

I've been asked by Katie Guggenheim who is currently on the RCA course to make a new piece of work for the weekend's project.

My contribution will be a printed exhibition guide entitled Guide Two, available to the visitor throughout the weekend. The Guide describes the locations in which works from the Collection that feature in 'Testing Ground' were previously on display.

New works by S/Z and Louise Weiss have also been commissioned as part of the project.

Tableau Vivant: A Wandering Retrospective

noreply@blogger.com (Rosie Cooper) — Fri, 03 Dec 2010 14:16:00 +0000

Image: Orphee Carbon Copy, Diamond Panaflex, Tai Shani, 2010.

Anna Barham /// Winnie Cott /// The Hal an Tow /// Bruce McLean / Nice Style: The World’s First Pose Band ///Mistick Krewe of Comus /// The New Orleans Society for Tableau Vivant /// Pablo Picasso / Erik Satie / Léonide Massine ///Audrey Reynolds /// Tai Shani

Presented as part of Prospect 1.5 New Orleans

New Orleans, Louisiana, USA

6th & 13th November 2010

Tableau Vivant: A Wandering Retrospective presents a selection of historic tableaux vivants alongside specially conceived tableaux by Tai Shani (UK), Audrey Reynolds (UK), Winnie Cott (FR), Anna Barham (UK) and The New Orleans Society for Tableau Vivant.

The show takes place on a flat bed truck that will proceed slowly up Julia St., making stops between the river and St. Charles Avenue.

At each stop, a different tableau vivant will be performed. The show will be repeated the following weekend in the St. Claude Arts District.

Tableau Vivant translates literally as “living picture”: a group or individual in a carefully arranged pose that is held for a period of time. It frequently includes elaborate sets, costumes, props and sometimes music. Performed variously as a parlour game, carnival attraction, pageant, pedagogic tool or propaganda image, tableaux vivants usually illustrate popular mythologies, famous paintings, classical, archetypal or historic events, and are most often performed within the context of informal social gatherings. They are a way of stepping into the role of an historic figure, enhancing self-image or manipulating public identity; of bringing to life significant scenes in a subjective context, or revisiting a snapshot of the past and re-committing it to memory.

As well as having a strong relationship to the still image, the tableaux vivant is a living thing perpetually situated in a morphological state between statue and movement. The impossibility of holding a certain pose for a long stretch of time means that the tableau vivant can never embody the stillness to which it apparently aspires – rather, is time stretched and slowed.

Presenting this group exhibition as a series of live tableaux exposes its unstable state, and within this, it’s numerous ends.

Locating the project in New Orleans, a city ingrained with the composite histories of popular performance traditions, Tableau Vivant: A Wandering Retrospective also considers the history of tableau vivant within the frame of popular folk performance. Tableau Vivant: A Wandering Retrospective inhabits a space between the histories of high art and popular entertainment: illuminating the nature of the tableaux but also suggesting an alternative history for contemporary visual art performance.

An Overview of Presented Tableaux:

Winnie Cott’s tableau Meanwhile… The Next Day records the first public film screening; an iconic moment of crystallized potential re-created through the lens of the present.

A scene from Ovid’s epic Metamorphosis is lifted from an illustration of the tableau a The Mystick Krewe of Comus’ 1878 Tableau Ball on that theme. Comus was the first of the old-line Mardi Gras float krewes.

The tableau of Saint George defeating the Dragon is taken from the ancient Cornish Hal an Tow, in which song is sung, and the two characters spring forward and freeze in battle mode: consigning the image to historic record.

Anna Barham’s tableau presents the shape-shifting Proteus; a Greek God with the ability to tell the future: but continually evading capture by changing from one form into another. His transformation is suspended in live tableau, and he becomes a tangible portal to the future.

Tai Shani transposes the Orphic myth to the golden hills of California. On the edge of the Underworld, Orpheus is both a Panaflex camera and his muse Eurydice. Orpheus records himself and like the myth he becomes immortal yet simultaneously destroys himself forever.

Audrey Reynolds’ Une Conclusion will recreate part of a sequence of pre-arrival whilst holding onto the relevant emotions – hope, tedium, anxiety.

A tableau specially conceived by the New Orleans Tableau Vivant Society that will feature outlandish creatures, fire and the fall of Rome; It is entitled The Flora and Fauna of Ceasar’s Nose as he Looked Over his Right Shoulder at Sunset.

Other presentations include a re-creation of Bruce McLean’s 1974 work with Nice Style: the World’s First Pose Band, High Up on a Baroque Palazzo, at once scultpure and rock star gesture; and a scene from the 1924 tableau vivant ballet Mercure by Pablo Picasso and Erik Satie, with choreography by Massine, originally commissioned by Etienne de Beaumont for one of his extravagant parties.

Tableau Vivant: A Wandering Retrospective is curated by Rosie Cooper (UK) and produced by New Orleans Airlift.

A small souvenir publication will be available to the audience on the route. It will include special contributions from Rose English, Aura Satz, Sally O’Reilly and Henri Schindler.

Winnie Cott Meanwhile... The Next Day

Cornish Traditional: Hal an Tow (ancient / date unknown)

Anna Barham: Proteus (for Four Figures)


Mistick Krewe of Comus: Metamorphosis of Ovid (1878)

Satie, Massine, Picasso: Mercure (1924)

Bruce McLean / Nice Style: High Up on a Baroque Palazzo (1974)

Future Beauty: 30 Years of Japanese Fashion (Public Programme, Barbican Art Gallery)

noreply@blogger.com (Rosie Cooper) — Fri, 01 Oct 2010 14:16:00 +0000


Barbican Cosplay Extravaganza. Photo credit: India Roper-Evans

Download a full events programme on the right hand side of the Barbican's Future Beauty page here.

Highlights included a Black themed evening with Diane Pernet, a Centre-wide Cosplay event (above), Beauty Party with Charlie Le Mindu and Alex Box and a panel discussion on Kawaii featuring Sharon Kinsella.

General Inquiry Issue 1 / Acknowledgements

noreply@blogger.com (Rosie Cooper) — Mon, 13 Sep 2010 17:40:00 +0000

Featuring a contribution from myself and Audrey Reynolds, Acknowledgements, which we updated weekly for almost 2 months.

Acknowledgements is an ongoing work begun during our collaborative exhibition Temporary Secretary at Fordham Gallery, London, in 2005.

General Inquiry is a quarterly online publication initiated by Kazimierz Jankowski. He writes - "It is also the working title for a web based curatorial enterprise, loosely (cautiously) set up to explore the production of writing by artists."

General Inquiry Issue 1 Launch / Acknowledgements; Signing Event

noreply@blogger.com (Rosie Cooper) — Sun, 12 Sep 2010 19:46:00 +0000

Audrey and I signed specially made compliments slips at the launch event for General Inquiry, with personal messages upon request.

The launch took place at X Marks the Bokship on Saturday 11 September. Our signing took place at 7pm and lasted for half an hour.

Queuing outside for the signing

Yes Way Rat T-Shirts

noreply@blogger.com (Rosie Cooper) — Fri, 03 Sep 2010 14:07:00 +0000

Bootleg t-shirts sold outside Auto Italia / Upset the Rhythm Yes Way festival in August 2010 featuring the tambourine playing Rat from Dress Rehearsal for a Stage Show Part III.

Band names from the festival, printed on the t-shirts, were: Islet, Time, Cleckhuddersfax, Temperatures, Dam Mantle, Tqqundo Frrrrr and Jelas.

Sizes from S to XL were available. One for £7, two for £12.

Someone even made their own bootleg of the bootleg.

If you would like to buy one, please get in touch with Auto Italia South East.

The Surreal House (Public Programme, Barbican Art Gallery)

noreply@blogger.com (Rosie Cooper) — Mon, 12 Jul 2010 15:49:00 +0000

Ole Hagen performs as part of Fun House, 10 July. Photo: Kazimierz Jankowski

Download a full events programme on the right hand side of the Barbican's page for The Surreal House here.

Every Thursday evening throughout the exhibition (10 June - 12 September '10), the Gallery opened late to host a varied programme of talks, performances, screenings. Each evening was designed to interrogate a particular aspect of the exhibition: the evenings were organised according to themes such as House of Fear, Magic and the Occult, Words, Virtual Worlds, Convulsive Architecture and Erotic.

Highlights included a Lost Luggage Auction organised by Wellers Auctions Last Night I Dreamt I was Venus from Beyond The Mirrors, a new commission from Tai Shani in response to Salvador Dali's Dream of Venus Pavilion (here); a night of interrogations organised by Tom McCarthy's International Necronautical Society; and a first time UK performance of Dream Chamber by Norwegian artist Ane Lan. This varied programme featured new or existing works from artists and writers such as Brian Catling, Katarzyna Kozyra, Ole Hagen, Le Gun, Better Place Portraiture, Ryan Trecartin, Volker Eichelmann, Jeremy Blake, Aura Satz, Barry Curtis, Mary Ann Caws, Brian Dillon, Anna Barham, Elizabeth McAlpine, Philomene Pirecki, Mark Aerial Waller and Mobile Studio.

Monaco Magazine Issue 1 / Phantom of the Opera: Phantom (Publication & Event)

noreply@blogger.com (Rosie Cooper) — Fri, 25 Jun 2010 13:33:00 +0000

Phantom of the Opera: Phantom - a contribution in the form of a page in the magazine, and a performance / screening event. Both contributions describe a currently unrealised project: to dramatise Gaston Leroux's 1910 novel The Phantom of the Opera and have it performed by an amateur dramatics society.

Both elements featured Steven Kendrat's 5 minute film version of Phantom of the Opera, made in 1999 when Steven was 13 and featuring a cast of family members and friends. This film is made in preparation for Kendrat's currently unrealised ambition to make his own feature-length film version.

MONACO MAGAZINE (edited by Katie Guggenheim) is a publication, a website and a programme of events. The format of a periodical magazine is used as an organisational structure to produce content across three platforms. Instead of reviewing or previewing, the magazine is devoted to sharing ideas and information about things that haven’t happened, and maybe never will (artworks that are impossible to realise, projects that haven’t got off the ground, the beginnings of ideas, or research that is still ongoing). The aim is not to catalogue or archive these projects, instead they are considered as starting points.

Magazine:

Launch:

Friday 25th June, 6-9pm

SE8 Gallery, 171 Deptford High Street, London SE8 3NU

Sarah Bowerman read a section from a common postscript to Leroux's novel Phantom of the Opera - a description of extraordinary architecture of the Opera Garnier (the opera house in which the book is set) that appeared in Scribner's Magazine, in 1879, a short time after the building was completed.

Sarah's reading was followed by a screening of Steven Kendrat's 5 minute Phantom of the Opera (1999).

The audience:

Dress Rehearsal for a Stage Show Part III: Performance Grand Finale

noreply@blogger.com (Rosie Cooper) — Wed, 21 Apr 2010 14:02:00 +0000

PERFORMANCE GRAND FINALE

E:vent Gallery

Saturday 24 April 2010, 7:30pm

Featuring the original performance, with reference to Parts I and II (a Ghost version), the Rat, the Ultimate Ghost and the Interval Tableau.

Narrator: Sarah Bowerman

Grey Ghost / Tree: Rachel Gammon

The Ultimate Ghost: Ann Pidcock

Black Ghost: Tim Spooner

Harlequin Ghost: Gemma Tortella

With Special Guest Matthew Robins, and featuring Audrey Reynolds' Interval Tableau.

Performance Grand Finale is part of Dress Rehearsal for a Stage Show Part III (20 March - 25 April, E:vent Gallery).

Scene / Script:

A backdrop of gold glitter curtains, on a wooden stage. The lighting is arranged to light the performers in the simplest way possible. There is a cardboard concertina screen to the left of the stage (SCREEN 2), behind which props are stored.

There is a chair to the left, close to, but not on, the stage, set at an angle so that the action on the stage and the performers can be viewed simultaneously.

Two performers walk on to the stage. They are dressed in ghost costumes: one grey, and one black.

They assume their positions: the grey ghost to the left, and the black to the right.

The grey ghost is holding some branches with leaves attached.

Once they have stood there for a moment, they are joined by a woman. She is has practical clothes on, but her face is very well made up. Her role is to explain the first part of the performance: she is the Narrator. She sits on the chair that has been set up close to the stage.

Narrator: “The costumes in this part of the performance are ghost versions of the costumes seen in Dress Rehearsal for a Stage Show Part I, originally performed in 2008. What will now take place is a gestural re-enactment of Part I.

“As well as the fact that this is a Ghost performance, there are naturally some changes to the set, and to what used to be the dialogue.. For example, in the original performance Part I, the character in the grey costume, who is in fact playing a Tree, held up a piece of card with the name of the performance on it. The character in the black costume then introduced the show by explaining that it was to include a cast of five, a variety of settings, two acts (one before the interval, and two afterwards). She explained that Act One is made up of two scenes – and that act two is made up of four scenes; the fourth of which was to be the Grand Finale. She then invited the audience members to think of themselves as an imaginary audience. The particulars of the length of the show and its content are of course a bit inaccurate now – the performance has moved on since then, new parts have developed and as you will see there are more than two acts, and more than five characters.”

The Ghosts start to move slowly around the stage, arranging themselves and “using” the space. The Black Ghost makes a series of traditional, but somehow inadequate, dance moves towards the front of the stage.

Narrator: “This part is the same as Part I. You can see that the characters are using all of the stage; their movements are therefore not restricted.”

The Ghosts continue to move around, as in Part I. The Grey Ghost / Tree character switches on the disco lights, creating a sense of tension.

The Grey Ghost / Tree then pulls a rope that causes the middle section of curtain to collapse, revealing the Harlequin Ghost. The Harlequin Ghost stands still. Behind the Harlequin Ghost is a cardboard concertina backdrop; very closely resembling SCREEN 2. This is in fact SCREEN 1.

Narrator: “Tension has now been built with the lighting and dramatic action. At this point, the Black Ghost let the audience know that there would be a short interval of approximately one minute, in keeping with the length of the show. This time the performers will hold the scene you can see here for slightly longer; the interval for Part III will follow a little later.

Pause. Everyone shifts their positions a little.

Narrator: “So now, here is a new character for the second part of the show. You can see that there is a cardboard screen at the back of this scene, quite similar to the screen you can see behind me. In Part I, this backdrop depicted the inside of a cave. This time the cardboard screen seemed to work much better, so it was decided that this should be used instead.

Harlequin Ghost creeps meaninglessly across her area of the stage, behind and in front of the curtain.

Narrator: “At this point in the performance, the Black Ghost explained that the fourth character who one sees in the background should really be a bearded lady, whose beard would be made of wool. It was also suggested that in later versions of this performance she would appear to be knitting her own beard. This idea has been removed completely. There was another suggestion, mentioned within the dialogue for Part I, that the backdrop (that is, the image of the cave,) would fall to reveal another backdrop of approximately the same size, depicting another aspect of the show. It was described as being made from thick, dark fabric and covered with gold stars to match the golden curtains.

“The Black Ghost then explained that this backdrop wouldn’t be seen tonight. She used a particular phrase which now seems very outdated and that seemed out of place in this new performance.

“She went on to say that from behind this new backdrop, a giant rat would be found. The Rat would emerge from the backdrop, playing the final theme song, to be danced to by all the cast members.

“At that point, there was no Rat. The Rat was intended to be a musician. On this occasion, however, the rat does exist – even though this other layer of the backdrop does not – it was also seen to be unnecessary for this performance - and so an improved version of the final dance can now be performed with the assistance of the musical rat.”

At this point, all the Ghosts stand in a line. They remove their ghost costumes, to reveal slightly better versions of their original outfits. A stage assistant dressed in black comes on to the stage to remove the costumes.

From behind the cardboard screen comes the Rat. He has a tambourine, and starts to play it.

All Ghosts dance: the dance that is seen in the video for Part II.

The dance lasts for around 5 minutes.

After 5 minutes, the 3 Ghosts and the Rat sit to the side of the stage, looking at the empty stage. The Narrator continues to sit at her chair to the left, also watching the stage.

A spotlight turns on, lighting an area in the middle of the stage, and a song begins (sung by Matthew Robins, offstage). The song is about the action that has just taken place, but it soon mutates into another narrative: a narrative that focuses more on the Rat and the history of the Rat. Throughout this part of the show, the stage remains empty.

The spotlight turns off.

Narrator: “At this point in the performance it was decided that there should be a short interval.”

All characters exit the stage. The Narrator is welcome to go and have a drink at the bar, but her focus should be on looking over her programme notes, rather than socialising too much. All other characters should gather behind SCREEN 2, and sit quietly.

The Stage Assistants then set up the objects and arrangement of furniture that make up Audrey Reynolds’ Interval Tableau.

The Interval Tableau will not be announced, but its presence will be noted in the programme.

INTERVAL: 15 MINUTES

At the end of the Interval, before all the audience have sat down, the curtains are put back up, and the Interval Tableau is removed.

When the interval is over, everyone returns to the stage, striking various dramatic poses.

Narrator: “So now here is the part that is the Grand Finale, for this performance at least. It will take the form of a dramatic dance routine, with costumes that have the possibility to give emphasis to the dance itself. It will also bring in a special new character, or perhaps characters, that have been absent in the production so far. It was also decided that at this point it would be appropriate for a professional dancer to be involved.”

A dance is begun by those on stage. The Rat provides musical accompaniment on the tambourine, but this time the sound is minimal.

During the course of the dance, another character appears on the stage. This character is a much better dancer than everyone else who has appeared so far. This character is dressed in a very elaborate ghost costume embellished with sequins and decorations (none of the decorations are symbolic in any way (although of course this Ghost is supposed to represent theatre more generally, and future performances); apart from maybe a beard, which symbolises the absence of the Bearded Lady). This character will perform some dance moves in the centre of the stage whilst everyone else poses in a sequence of freeze frames.

The dance will last for around 7 minutes. It will finish when the new Ghost Dancer freezes as well. At this point, all the performers will shuffle off the stage, and behind SCREEN 2.

END

Ghost costumes by Sarah Bowerman, Ultimate Ghost costume by Tim Spooner. Set and Rat costume by Rosie Cooper.

Dress Rehearsal for a Stage Show Part III: Talks Programme

noreply@blogger.com (Rosie Cooper) — Sun, 11 Apr 2010 14:26:00 +0000

David Lillington My Favourite Pictures of Kurt Schwitters' Merzbau

11 April
E:vent Gallery

A programme of talks as part of Dress Rehearsal for a Stage Show Part III.

Sarah Bowerman gave a talk on her childhood obsession with Gaston Leroux's 1910 novel Phantom of the Opera;

David Lillington presented his favourite images of Kurt Schwitters' Merzbau;

Fanny Paul Clinton delivered a reading on abyssal space.

Dress Rehearsal for a Stage Show Part III

noreply@blogger.com (Rosie Cooper) — Sat, 20 Mar 2010 13:52:00 +0000

Still image from Dress Rehearsal for a Stage Show Part II (video, 2009)

Dominique Baron-Bonarjee /// Sarah Bowerman /// Fanny Paul Clinton /// Rachel Gammon /// Joanne Kernan /// David Lillington /// Gavin Pearce /// Ann Pidcock /// Audrey Reynolds /// Matthew Robins /// Tim Spooner /// Gemma Tortella

20 March - 25 April '10

E:vent Gallery
96 Teesdale Street
London

Dress Rehearsal for a Stage Show Part III is the culmination of a 3 year multi-part project by artist / curator Rosie Cooper. The exhibition has been commissioned by E:vent Gallery with an intertwined programme of live performance and talks.

This show navigates the tangential possibilities within the incomplete or ongoing work: including external influences, time spent in preparation, the numerous diversions possible within the performance encounter, and the abstractions within theatrical representation.

The gallery exhibition includes the film Dress Rehearsal for a Stage Show Part II and a sculpture by Audrey Reynolds.

Installation Shots:

Exhibition Poster by Joanne Kernan (left); Fancy Interior Rosie Cooper, 2010 (right)

Dress Rehearsal for a Stage Show Part II, video, Rosie Cooper 2009 (left). A Sculpture by Audrey Reynolds, Audrey Reynolds, 2010 (right.

Savoy Cafe

noreply@blogger.com (Rosie Cooper) — Thu, 03 Sep 2009 19:00:00 +0000

Image: Emily Webber

A series of site specific events held on consecutive Saturdays

25 July – 29 August 2009

Featuring, amongst others:
The UK premiere of Kalup Linzy's dramatic new film "Keys to Our Heart" - Tai Shani's fantastical cast of Greek Gods, coffee cups and super-secretaries - Audrey Reynolds' One Picture Gallery, with a painting by Luca Bertolo - an evening in conversation with Corrado Coltelli with films by Saint Etienne - Katie Guggenheim's MENU, a group show in the form of a menu of art - and - International Everything: a series of short talks by non specialist enthusiasts.

The Savoy Cafe is a former East London cafe that has been vacant since the mid 1990s. The building, which is still owned by the Coltelli family who grew up there in the 1950s, retains its original 1930s décor and fascia.

It is the aim that this project will provide an inspiration to developers who choose to sensitively add to the regeneration activities of Hackney Central, and to other artists and curators who choose Hackney Central for their activities.

In addition, work already undertaken with the 20th Century Society and Hackney Museum confirms the need for the Savoy Café’s interior to be preserved, listed and sensitively restored in the future. The Savoy Café is has of the only remaining in-tact early 20th Century interiors known in Hackney.

It is the building’s décor, history and location that have informed the selection of work for this project.

Saturday 25th July

4pm – 9pm
talk / films at 6.30pm

In Conversation with Corrado Coltelli, with films by Saint Etienne

Corrado Coltelli grew up in the Savoy Café during its heyday. Accompanied by “Today's Special”, films from Saint Etienne and Paul Kelly, exploring the legacy of the traditional London café. You can see the films here, here and here
Part of London 2012 Open Weekend.

Saturday 1st August
1pm – 9pm

MENU

A group show with work by twenty artists, delivered to seated exhibition visitors upon their request. Artworks will be handled, assembled, observed and even eaten: temporarily combining to form miniature table-top exhibitions. The chosen artists will also exploit the unusual one-on-one relationship between artwork and viewer that this exhibition creates. Curated by Katie Guggenheim, with works by: Zayne Armstrong, Côme, Jennifer Bailey, Mark Barker, Debuffu, Oscar Carlson, Danielle Dean, Constintin, Sophie Aschauer, Amanda Dennis, Sarah Elliott, Jenifer Evans, Censor, Alexander Hassenpflug, Kazimierz Jankowski, Giorgio Silverio, Richard John Jones, Atalya Laufer, Ciment, Rachel Pimm, Aki Nagasaka, Patrick Shier, Django Pemberton.

Saturday 8th August
7pm, 7.45pm,
8.30pm, 9.15pm
And Coffhorus Resounds: Gravastar or Candy from Paradise, Tai Shani

Specially commissioned for the Savoy Café, and constructed around Frederik Pohl’s story ‘The Tunnel Under the World’, this fantastical, super-styled performance is an unfolding exploration of loss, love, trauma, time travel and post nuclear apocalypse market research. The performance, which will be viewed from a specifically constructed auditorium, includes a cast of Greek Gods, animated coffee cups and 1950’s secretaries. Tai’s work has most recently been presented at the Arnolfini and the Royal Academy.

Saturday 15th August
4pm – 9pm
talks at 7pm

International Everything

An evening of short talks by non specialist enthusiasts (originally devised with Redux projects).

Nicola Stylianou - Hey! Two Way Pockaway: an Introduction to the Mardi Gras Indians of New Orleans.

Sarah Bowerman - The Duchess of Devonshire’s Jubilee Ball: 700 people, 5 Courts, 2 Cleopatras, a “Double Duchess” and Ortolan in Aspic (for one night only). Mark Webber - Burning a Hole Where I Lay: the possibility of a 33 hour film-poem exploring the popular metaphor of love as fire. En route we visit Elvis, Orford Ness and the bombing of Hiroshima.

Saturday 22nd August
4pm – 9.30pm
film at 7pm & 9pm

Keys to Our Heart, Kalup Linzy

The UK premiere of Guggenheim Fellow Kalup Linzy’s new film. Keys to Our Heart is a John-Waters-esque melodrama featuring Linzy as a misanthropic grande dame who dispenses advice to a trio of troubled young lovers. With a strong following in his native USA (“A star is born. His name is Kalup Linzy.” - New York Times), this will be the first showing of Linzy’s work in London since its appearance at the Hayward gallery in 2008. Keys to Our Heart was originally commissioned by Prospect 1 New Orleans Biennial in 2008.

Saturday 29th August
4pm – 9pm

The One Picture Gallery
featuring a painting by Italian Artist Luca Bertolo.

Adapting Russian Gallerist Valery Petrovich Sazonov’s original ‘One-Picture Gallery’ which he opened in Penza in 1983, we will be setting a carefully chosen painting adrift from the common comforts of its native contexts, which we will replace with music, seating and timing. Luca Bertolo (b. 1968) lives and works on the Apuan Alps in Tuscany. Recent solo exhibitions include at Galleria SpazioA, Italy, and ‘The Domain of Painting’, Arcade, London. Presented by Audrey Reynolds.

The Savoy Cafe project was commissioned and funded by Hackney Council.

The One Picture Gallery

Corrado Coltelli


MENU

Tai Shani

When The Wind Blows Up You: Bonnie Camplin at Chisenhale

noreply@blogger.com (Rosie Cooper) — Fri, 17 Jul 2009 17:53:00 +0000

More information here.

FILM SHOW

noreply@blogger.com (Rosie Cooper) — Sun, 21 Jun 2009 15:51:00 +0000

Matt Calderwood, Plank, 1998, 4'00". Video with sound.

FILM SHOW

At Home Live Art’s “The Big Event”

Myatt’s Fields Park, Knatchbull Road, Camberwell SE5

20^th June 2pm – 7pm

Matt Calderwood /// Bonnie Camplin /// Simon Warwick Green /// Jacopo Miliani /// Audrey Reynolds /// Salomon Rogberg /// Richard Wilson

A series of contemporary artist films, shown in an enclosed booth in a Victorian Fair. This project, and the choice of works to show, references the fact that most people's first encounter with film as a medium took place in the fairground. From the late 19th century, travelling showmen and entrepreneurs co-opted this new medium, bringing it to excited audiences: sometimes to encourage them to visit other attractions, and sometimes as things to be seen on their own. The films they presented were usually no longer than 2 minutes, were non narrative and would most often simply show something interesting that moved - cats boxing, or a dance.

FILM SHOW presents contemporary works by 7 artists, all of whose works have something of these qualities of the earliest film about them: a showy quality, a sense of capturing and working in a concentrated moment, or scene.

Richard Wilson, The World Famous Richard Curtis & his Dog Dancing Display Team & the Fantastic Xerox Teens, Together, for One Night Only: Part 1, 2007. 03:24. Video with sound.

Salomon Rogberg, The Appearance, 2008. 03:33. Video with sound; subtitled.

Audrey Reynolds, Early Film, 2009. 02:24. Video with sound.

Bonnie Camplin, Colonial Fanny, 2005. 01:33. Video, silent.

Simon Warwick Green, The Aqua Gym, 2002. 03:23. Video with sound.

Jacopo Miliani, Black Palms, 2007. 02:00. Video with sound.

2HB Issue 1 / Acknowledgements

noreply@blogger.com (Rosie Cooper) — Tue, 31 Mar 2009 13:01:00 +0000

Featuring a contribution from myself and Audrey Reynolds, Acknowledgements.

Acknowledgements is an ongoing work begun during our collaborative exhibition Temporary Secretary at Fordham Gallery, London, in 2005.

Produced by CCA Glasgow, 2HB is a quarterly publication dedicated to creative writing and experimental writing in contemporary art. 2HB is edited by Louise Shelley and Francis McKee.

Text:

This page is made use of in order to convey appreciation and indebtedness to others. On this occasion we include Mary and Margaret G., Mère Marie Poussepin, John O'Donohue, L. Fuller, Gaston Leroux, Ida, Doris Lessing and La Marquise de Bellbeuf. There are others.

Believe us,

A.R. and R.K.C.

Performance of A Mysterium

noreply@blogger.com (Rosie Cooper) — Sun, 10 Aug 2008 10:50:00 +0000

Performance of A Mysterium. Photo: Beck Rainford

The Walpole Bay Hotel
Margate, 2nd May '08
&
The Soho Arts Theatre
London, 11th May '08

“The cast of performers includes an orchestra, a large mixed choir, an instrument with visual effects, dancers, a procession, incense, and rhythmic textural articulation. The cathedral in which it will take place will not be of one single type of stone but will continually change with the atmosphere and motion of the Mysterium. This will be done with the aid of mists and lights, which will modify the architectural contours.”
Alexander Scriabin (1872-1915)

This is one way that Russian composer Scriabin described Mysterium, his unwritten magnum opus. Thought by some to be both impossibly conceived and ultimately unperformable, Mysterium was to last for seven days and seven nights, and was to take place at the foot of the Himalayas. Within this piece he envisaged towers of fire and bells hung from clouds: and that it should transform humanity through a kind of blissful apocalypse. The ideas surrounding Mysterium fluctuated, becoming both more and less vague throughout the last part of Scriabin’s life. 53 pages of musical sketches remain of this work, alongside ambitious, nebulous stage directions and an epic poem.

Performance of A Mysterium is an articulation of the nature of this work. It embraces the idea of an inbuilt mechanism for utter unrealisability: as it appears in the original, and in this evocation. It will take into account the ghostliness of Scriabin’s ideas for Mysterium as they might haunt this performance, and, as tradition would indicate, Performance of A Mysterium will also incorporate the spectres of my own practise.

The show will incorporate a pianist who plays the pieces that Scriabin completed as ideas for Mysterium; and a spectacle to include large mountains, dramatic lighting, palms and confetti. Although the performance is conceived as a whole, the music is separated from the spectacle – which takes place in silence – so as not to indicate that one should be a soundtrack to the other.

Commissioned by Margate Rocks Festival '08, and supported by the Arts Council of England.

tester

noreply@blogger.com (Rosie Cooper) — Tue, 01 Jan 2008 17:22:00 +0000

PERFORMANCE GRAND FINALE

The Empress Tea Room

noreply@blogger.com (Rosie Cooper) — Tue, 04 Dec 2007 19:05:00 +0000


Ludovica Gioscia Highway E154

Serving tea, cake and related light refreshment
From the 7^th – 22^nd July 2007

270 Mare Street, London E8 1HE

Bonnie Camplin // Marcia Farquhar // Ludovica Gioscia // Audrey Reynolds' One Picture Gallery with a painting by Paula Kane // Aura Satz // Matthew Robins & Tim Spooner // Today is Boring

The scene is set. A Tea Room, erected for the duration of the Hackney Empire's annual Spice Festival, presents, amongst the cakes and decorations, a series of shows and especially commissioned work that discusses and presents a certain theatricality, a staging of events and an audience reception.

Shows include a single painting with a musical accompaniment, sinister darts, and an imaginary tea party.

Marcia Farquhar Tea With Me

Saturday 7^th July, 4:30, 5:30, 6, 6:30, 7 & 8pm

Each performance is for a small audience. Ask at the counter to book a space.

An imaginary tea party at which the guests are disconcertingly implicated like stuffed animals, or toys. The table is, to all appearances, beautifully presented for the arrival of the guests: yet the presence of the hostess is unusual, and the vital ingredients are strangely absent.

Paula Kane Echoes in the Forest
(image courtesy Emily Tsingou Gallery)

The Audrey Reynolds One Picture Gallery presents a painting by Paula Kane

Thursday 12^th July, 6-9pm

Reynolds invites us to the one-evening-only presentation of a carefully chosen single painting, “Echoes in the Trees” by Paula Kane. Curtains, spotlighting and delicate musical accompaniment create a stage, focus and illumination for Kane’s eerily familiar landscape painting.

Aura Satz Suspending Disbelief: Persuasive Findings

Friday 13^th July, 7pm

The wilful suspension of disbelief of the audience, the persuasive qualities of a piece of art - discussed and performed via ideas of hypnosis, DIY subliminal recordings, Spiritualism and acting techniques. This performance follows Suspending Disbelief, a workshop for artists commissioned and hosted by The Empress Tea Room.

Matthew Robins & Tim Spooner present new work from the Punch and Judy Project

Saturday 14^th July, 7:30pm

Whales, snakes, the sea - loosely approximated biblical tales become new stories, set to a kind of operetta played on a small harmonium. The stories become abut how particular tales are absorbed, how memories are processed and filtered through other stories, through yet more recollections that may or may not be related. The story is filtered once more: presenting itself in a style that roughly mimics a traditional Punch and Judy show.

Ludovica Gioscia Highway E154

Thursday 19^th July, 6-9pm

Trundling around the Tea Room, at various degrees of speed and enthusiasm, a series of uber-embellished remote control objects – a tea set, perhaps a doughnut. Hyper-baroque (baroque baroque?), Gioscia’s work is a clash of aesthetics, eras and ideas, a collision of tastes – all of which all stubbornly disallow the notion of décor as background.

Bonnie Camplin Summer Goats

Friday 20^th July, 6-9pm

Bonnie Camplin and Susanne Oberbeck (No Bra): head to head in a darts tournament. It will be a highly ritualised event that pays particular attention to specific details modelled on televised darts: that, in this context, become nothing but a creepy and unnecessarily exaggerated caricature. Success in the tournament will be decided by the arbiter, and will be largely arbitrary.

Today is Boring Film Programme

Saturday 21^st July, 11am-9pm

The very first East End specialist Arthouse video store presents a selection of obscure and re-discovered treasures that explore a light-hearted internationalism, provocative global consciousness, and real and imaginary worlds. Films on the day include the Moomins and Black Orpheus.