15.09.2011
'you can't be what you can't see'
I have the fortune to be attending the Australian Theatre Forum, which is being held in Brisbane at the Powerhouse. I had reasonably low expectations, not so much of the event, more of myself in relation to the event. Mostly because I am pretty tired from a very full year of work and also because I find the thought of being in an opening-night-foyer type of situation for three days pretty daunting. I worried about my own capacity to manage and engage. But it’s been fantastic.
Herewith follows some random thoughts, glimpses, moments.
one. I have renewed my determination to keep expanding this website, particularly in terms of archiving and recording my own work.
I mean, that was one of the reasons I set up this website in the first place. And I was reminded of this desire and need quite recently when I watched the fabulous documentary created by Amy Gebhart for Art Nation about Moira Finucane and Jackie Smith and the process of creating The Carnival of Mysteries. The documentary is really wonderful, but, for me, for someone who was involved in the process from pretty early on…like years before it happened… I found it quite painful to see it because it shows SO LITTLE of what happened, of how long the process was, of how many millions of hours of work it took, of how much Moira and Jackie put into it and how much all of the artists put into it, and what the artists got out of it, how it changed them, their work, their process, and also what the audience received, felt, took away. The documentary reminded me of the absolute ephemeral, and transient nature of my work…as it is, and as it should be, but that consequently there is a need to record, to document.
Documenting our own work is also a way for artists to have more control over what is said about our work. Deborah Hay speaks very passionately about this and changed my understanding of this issue forever. It is our responsibility to take control of the creating, recording and transmission of the SPECIFIC WORDS which are used to describe our work and process. Writing/documenting gives us practice in articulating, talking and thinking about the work we do, the processes that occur, and the discoveries, problems, issues, and ideas that occur. To document gives us and others a way of contextualising our practice. This can be good also for criticism of the work…if more information is available, more understanding is possible.
Failure can be reflected upon, drawn on, mulled over, contextualised and seen as a step between point A and point B, rather than the point at which everything stopped.
New solutions, new paradigms, new ideas, new working methods, new thoughts, new approaches should be documented. It helps them spread. ‘The new is understood in relation to what isn’t new.’ Alison Croggon
Documentation provides a way, if it is needed or wanted, to record some of the ways one’s art has impacted on the lives of people around us, audience or whoever. We don’t need to be statisticians, just to tell these stories.
It’s naming: naming heritage, lineage, connections, family in art, family not in art, influences, important people, important books, important ideas, hopes, ideals, visions. The naming, the repeating, the acknowledging, the telling.
Over and over and over again. If need be.
two. The development of artists as leaders. Artists are dynamic, connected, entrepreneurial, skillful, political, resourceful, tough, funny, alive. They carry the possibility of providing a whole other set of parameters. There are more people in the creative industries than in the entire mining sector. Why don’t we have more influence? An artists' political party could, possibly, change everything…forever. ‘You can’t be what you can’t see.’ Candy Bowers
three. Dialogue, and Time. ‘Dialogue is exhilarating and fundamental.’ Rose Myers. I come back to it again and again and again. Ariane Mnouchkine talked often about the lunch/dinner table at which the members of her company Teatre du Soleil would sit, eat and talk, talk, talk. ‘It is the place where EVERY major decision of this company was made.’ Clearly this process needs TIME. Time for the dinner itself. Time for many dinners.
four. Ageing. Submerging artists. Oh god, I’m really going to have to get back to Simone..(de B). That affair of the mind and the heart is definitely NOT OVER YET.
five. Be an ‘R & D addict.’ (Paschal Berry) Go on, I dare you.
six. Mobility is mandatory.
seven. Live theatre can change the world. It changed my world. It continues to change my world. In the end, it comes down to this.