Solo Performance BignellM

The comments that I received from the group were generally very positive. All of the scenes through the piece made sense and appeared to have their attention. Some structural aspects needed to be addressed. I had a variety of small events that would join together in a final conclusion, however, each section needed a through line of action. As a result of this, much of my time recently has been focused on the transitions between each action so that the audience has a reasoning behind my movements. Unlike The Boy With Tape On His Face and Paul Currie, where the structure is a series of random events that don’t correlate (which in most cases is where the comedy stems from), I must justify every movement and transition so not to break the atmosphere.

Another issue is with the puppetry and making the movement as seamless as possible. This is mainly to do with creating the puppets from the clothes that I am wearing. It has become a challenge to incorporate this into the transitions without it looking messy. Through watching some examples of puppetry, I have noticed that generally the most exciting part of seeing the puppet is the initial reveal, so I need to practice creating the puppets so to not break to magic. It has been interesting to research puppetry as it appears to have more in common with magic than any other performance style. I feel this is due to the way in which both styles manipulate expectations and how the audience are as integral to the creation of the illusion as the magician or puppeteer. To me, in order for the puppetry to work, the reveal must be fast enough for the audience to question how It is done.

I have a show that has a lot of technical requirements which is very new to me. The composition of the stage becomes much more demanding as to where the technology is positioned and where I am in relation to it. The sound and videos are now integral to the piece. In the next coming weeks I shall be filming the Lionel Richie song, the office stereotype chins and the photocopier scenes. Once I have them I shall present some sneak peeks!

 

Here is the new edited version of my storyboard!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

My initial solo performance idea is based on when I was a young teenager I was afraid of ending up working in an office job. There was and still is a negative stigma against office work with programs like The Office and films like Office space showing a life of monotony or one where your life is dictated by your boss, being integrated into the corporate machine which may have been the cause of my unwillingness. As university is about to end for me and working life will begin once again for me, office work could very well be a reality, so I thought it would be appropriate to address it. My performance depicts a man trapped behind a desk during an office party with 90’s disco music playing in the background. This will be a motif that structures the show. There will be transitions between the office party and the character’s imagination. It character and action will represent the anxieties I had against office life. I am currently working and experimenting with all manners of puppetry and physical movement to find style that suit and fit well with the idea behind the piece.

One example I found during research and development with Shane, Danny and  Casey was using the chin to create a face. I thought this could be a funny way to portray office stereotypes. Here is an example of an office bigot.

 

I will be continuing to post new chin sketches but please write your reactions to it and tell me whether it is effective.

I have been experimenting on the staging of this concept to see which best suits the material. As I have set it at an office party, I firstly looked at performing it in promenade, with the audience being apart of the party with food and drink, possibly even singing karaoke. This would be a problem as too much would be going on, detracting from the action. Also, it would make it really difficult to create the desired illusions with the puppetry. With this in mind, I have decided to perform it end on with an audience of 15 to 20. This would be more intimate and would give every audience member a good view of the action and the intricate puppetry. Also, by being end on I can add more lighting and multi-media.

My interest in physical humour, mime and puppetry has lead  me to various artists that have become very popular on the British comedy circuit for their unique style. One in particular that has inspired me in my research and development is The Boy With Tape On His Face who uses random objects and a musical score to create a fresh and innovative way to puppeteer. The magic does not only come from his skills as a puppeteer and a performer but the inventiveness of his material and the intelligent use of song. The songs are all well known and creates an instant atmosphere for each little sketch (which you can see from the extract) as they are from popular culture and are easily recognizable.

 

The key thing that I have noticed to his approach is his use of focus and attention. His focus is constantly on the object to help give focus and allow the audience to project a character onto it, the music also helps with this. Once that is established his eyes can wander away from the puppet as the audiences are shown the relationship between him and the puppet, with all the other gaps being filled by the music and the audiences imagination. The humour comes from the absurd and creative narratives that he creates and the novelty music that accompanies it. Who would have ever thought oven gloves could be so entertaining!

The beginning of this other extract also highlights the skill and precise movement needed to bring the objects and scenarios to life. His sense of timing is impeccable and the subtlety of his actions  create a fictional relationship with an inanimate object. When I watched his show at the Edinburgh fringe in 2011 I found I was laughing at myself for believing his illusions.

 

 

One show that has always been inspirational to me was The Adventures of Alvin Sputnik: Deep Sea Explorer, which combines unique hand puppetry and a vibrant use of multi- media, which creates beautiful storytelling. The underwater world Is imagined through lighting, projections and animations which alters the space as Alvin has various puppet sizes to emphasise the magnitude of his journey.

 

I am still to this day astonished by how emotive the show was when all he had was three various sized puppets of Alvin and projections. I feel that the key to it was the story, which was established well at the beginning with an animated video. The introduction, much like The Boy With Tape On His Face, establishes the character and scenario so that the audience fills in the gaps with their imagination.

For me, these examples have inspired me to work with visuals, mime and puppetry in order to create a fun, surreal and possibly comical piece of performance. I have various images in my head that I am looking to attempt to re-create through the research and development phases. One of these ideas  is to portray when I was 16 I had a nightmare that I was going to work in an office. I am looking to create the atmosphere of the absurd through sock/ hand puppets, music and lighting to create a sense of distortion. I am keeping open minded and tomorrow I will be experimenting on a number of puppetry, mime and physical theatre techniques to find which one best suits my abilities and the performance I wish to create.

My next blog will be the results of my preliminary performance research.

The reading Solo in Soho: The Performer Alone by John Howell, was an interesting article that brought up many issues with the definition of solo performance and performance art. One comment in particular that struck me was that in the context of the solo performances, the truths displayed onstage are individual. That is to say that as there is one voice that acts as a testimony, where the opinions expressed are portrayed in a sense of ‘intimate personalism’. This act of testimony can only work if there is an interaction with an audience so that the messages conveyed are passed on and accounted for.

Performance art lies within the realm of aesthetics whereas solo performance can blend and blur the gaps between the aesthetic and literate. It is a sense of the unmitigated self, a performer without conscience of the outer world but of the inner self. This means that a solo performance has its own reality within the space and the context of the performance.

An aspect I have been interested in examining is the divide between the person and the persona. The person being the true self with a testimony that you portray honestly (testimonial) and the persona a false personality, a character that stems from you but demonstrates a dishonest truth. With the clowning from Paul Currie that I examined in the previous post, I feel that my work would be leaning more to that of the persona, but that isn’t to say that by being a persona I wont be expressing something of myself. Playing with a persona or character can be a safer way to express ideas and feelings for both the performer and the audience as the content is acknowledged as a performance. Many stand up comics do this as a way to distance themselves from the audience and the comments they make such as Frankie Boyle or Lee Mack. This performance style doesn’t have the same vulnerability of testimonials however it opens up more possibilities for the performer to venture through.

We all had a very big debate about what makes and artist and what is art, which brought some great responses. What it highlighted was that it is such a subjective commodity that we cannot simply define it as being art or not. The closest I have come to define it is to say that there must be an artistic vision, a process of finding exploring that vision and then the final product that demonstrates the journey. This takes into account that art is subjective so when we see art we don’t like, you still have admiration of the artistic process. To me art in any form is about the journey taken and so when we come across people who call themselves artist like Matt Chewewie, I get frustrated as their work is immediate, with little process or thought and the work is of a poor standard. He says in his artistic statement that people shouldn’t take his work seriously but if he doesn’t then who will?

The issue here is that with the internet as such a huge global platform, there is an immediacy to so called art where anyone can pick up a camera and do work and call themselves artist. This isn’t to say that in time this platform couldn’t be a great place to acknowledge work but at present it is breaking down what art represents. There is another side to the coin too as art galleries get away with creating a hostile atmosphere with the art they display. I have never been a huge fan of art in galleries as it can be very elitist and can look down on audiences but there is a process and occasionally a rebellion from the form which becomes exciting. For me the end product must match the process, so it you put three empty canvases in the Tate Modern I wont consider it art whether your a well renowned artist or not.

With all this in mind, it can sometimes just be a case that you look at something and it makes you feel something and you instinctively call it art, regardless of the platform its on or the artistic process taken. My sister was at Oxford doing a fine art degree and for her final piece she said she wanted to have fun and demonstrate to her lecturers that they need to not take art so seriously so she made this…

 

a six by eight foot rocking duck, which all the lecturers had to sit and rock back and forth in. Art should be playful and as artists, we sometimes need to remember that even though it requires effort, skill and time, we are in a privileged situation to express and enjoy our work with audiences who are looking to enjoy or revel in our accomplishments.