Event 9
National Review of Live Art
Glasgow
19-21.03.10
In the spirit of the self-reflective 30th anniversary theme of this year’s review, I have decided to present my impressions as a list of 30 things about the NRLA:
10 things I liked:
1. Liz Aggiss (humour; a good combination of informative showreels and showing her bum; subverting expectations)
2. Richard Layzell (engagement with the audience and clever deconstruction of documentation conventions and technical set-up)
3. Rosie Ward (good use of site and careful choice of work which allowed the environmental sounds of the trains above to permeate the work rather than clash with it)
4. Kate McIntosh and Eva Meyer-Keller (the work was simultaneously logical and ludicrous)
5. Los Torreznos (best performance of spoken word in the festival: I have never seen anyone count to 2100 in front of me before)
6. Lisa Wesley and Andrew Blackwood/Forced Entertainment (both works created interesting dystopian landscapes and narratives, which was all the more pertinent when visiting a strange city and not getting enough sleep)
7. Iona Kewney (honest use of materials: the box was just a box, not a theatrical prop. Also, she’d obviously considered the role of the performance of the sound track to her piece)
8. Michael Mayhew (disturbing use of eye-contact whilst misbehaving)
9. Kate Stannard (closest I’ve got to shared sport appreciation, and I like imagining what she would have passed on the distance she cycled)
10. Kirsten Lavers (honest interaction with audience, resulting in genuine answers)
10 good quotations from panellists and performers:
1. “John Cage’s ample back”
2. “thousands of years of mothers and daughters”
3. “if we don’t document this then it’s not going to have a life and we won’t be able to talk to people like you”
4. “both are equally unreliable” (documentation and anecdote)
5. “part of the taxonomy of performance tropes”
6. “embodied approach to historiography”
7. “here and now”
8. “re-enactment with meaning”
9. “Can we have the sound please, Johnny?”
10. “no more queueing”
10 things to think about including in my practice (with varying degrees of seriousness):
1. Dance and movement.
2. The verbal element, greeting the audience.
3. Site-specific projections.
4. Head mic/lapel mic.
5. Humour. More of it.
6. Documentation is not necessarily a fitting subject for the work.
7. Playing with technicians.
8. Staged photographs to symbolise a performance.
9. Investigate the use of the words ‘score’ and ‘instruction’.
10. Should I bite the bullet and finally join Facebook? Does it quantify friendship or provide important networking? Will I actually get round to checking it?
At the end of Sunday night we were each given a little plastic man, who had in previous years guaranteed your entry to a performance. Mine looks like he’s dancing. I had an impromptu photo opportunity on the train back, when I realised that Wayne Rooney was in fact the same as my plastic NRLA man. Here’s a photo.
I now have one more event to go to before my Escalator project is done: Blast Theory’s weekender at Artsadmin tomorrow and Sunday. Watch this space!
