Research
By now we were very happy that we had a somewhat structured performance, but we wanted to explore more and add something extra to our piece.
As we explored, we had the chance to read into several practitioners’ works and gain some inspiration. We came to James Yarker and his piece on Stan’s Café and Site Specific Performance. We needed to look at the way in which ‘emphasis on specificity than on site’ ((Yarker, J. (2007) Stan’s Café and Site Specific Performance. Coventry University.)) was more important. We had to create something, as Yarker states, ‘outside the conventions and expectations of a theatre.’ ((Yarker, J. (2007) Stan’s Café and Site Specific Performance. Coventry University.))This then made our group work on looking at ways in which we could represent our piece to our audience, and if we wanted them as the observers or to be a ‘part’ of the performance stepping outside the conventions as it were.
We then had a trip to the Lincolnshire Archives, which was what we wanted, to see how we could link the past with the present. As they had a lot of material we came to a blueprint of the Grandstand, and its plans to become a mortuary as a precaution to war. This then became an interesting idea that our group wanted to focus on. This was because we wanted to look how we could link the ideas of loss and death of the Grandstand to its own past and possible future. The mortuary was a very clear way of displaying this.
We then continued by looking at the space that we were performing in, the ‘weighing room’ at the Grandstand. We looked at how we could somehow be physically part of the room. ‘Transforms place into spaces or spaces in places’ ((Govan,E, Nicholson,H and Normington,K. (2007). Making a Performance. London: Routledge.p.126)), we wanted our space with in the room to become a ‘place.’ This then led us to the idea of camouflage, and the idea of being a part of the ‘space.’
When we started looking at camouflage, we were led to an artist called Christo and his idea of wrapping famous buildings. It is almost a symbolic gesture of preserving or hiding the building from sight, almost testing if people appreciate the building to start with. He states, ‘ It is easier for some to grasp the wrapping concept and refer to their artworks entirely as “wrapping,” but the work is more about altering an environment than wrapping – which is only one way to do that’ ((Christo and Jeanne-Claude. (2013). Frequently Asked Questions.Available: http://www.christojeanneclaude.net/faq. Last accessed 5th May 2013.)), which was what we wanted as a group and this was how we were going to try. But what to wrap it with, what material and what was our reason for it?
We then started to look at newspaper as a material, this was because of it use when ‘wrapping’ an object to keep it safe on the ‘journey’ of moving house. This idea then became very interesting but why newspaper? how did it link to the grandstand? Because of this we questioned using it, until we realised the Racing Post, a newspaper that was perfect for our piece. This was due to the fact that it offered symbolic and physical reference to horses, which related to the Grandstand itself. It also helped us to think of way of placing the idea of betting into our piece. Our performance had started to take shape.
Works Cited