T.A.N.K – Page 2

The T.A.N.K: Performance Reflection

Ben Middleton / May 7, 2013May 7, 2013 / T.A.N.K

One of the highlights of the tank group’s performance I think was the atmosphere we created the moment the audience walked into the room; with the rumble of the tank sound effect in the background with the monotonous chant of ‘From the blood, through the mud, to the green fields beyond.’ We created a sense of unease and tension within the audience since they did not really understand what was so far happening. Also, with the audience being cramped in right at the beginning it heightened the atmosphere because it gave them a sense of being trapped. Moreover the use of the chairs and netting, although ambiguous at first the audience soon got the idea of what we were creating, plus with the use of the netting whilst the audience would get the claustrophobic feeling we wanted, the netting still gave them some source of viewing, yet, I would have liked to experiment with restricting the audience’s view because the view inside a real tank was limited.

Moreover, the fact we used diary entries from soldiers who were in the tanks during the first world war brought a different sense of atmosphere to the performance ‘narratives provides coherence, a process of emplotment which configures these actions into a meaningful, comprehensible interpretation’ (( Postlewait, T. (1992) ‘History, Hermeneutics, and Narrativity’ in J.G Reinelt and J.R Roach (eds) Critical Theory and Performance University of Michigan Press pp. 356-368)) By using the diary entries we were bringing the piece back to the community and giving a voice back to the tank which would have otherwise not been there, plus the fact that one of the main aims of the whole safe-bet performance was to bring back the community and the voice to the grandstand. The narratives created by the use of diary entries are self-explanatory and not closed ‘but flexible and dynamic social practices, and this means that the experience of belonging to community always represents a partial account of experience’ ((Govan, Emma; Nicholson, Helen and Normington, Katie (2007) Making a Performance: Devising Histories and Contemporary Practices London: Routledge)) which shows how the audience would have understood the diary entries for actual experience and would have been able to empathetically imagine the happenings, in addition to this, the fact we used German diary extracts as well as English diary entries, we gave a balanced view point of the tank from both the victor and the victim.

However, one of the performances weaknesses was that we were still shaky with our lines, which caused some minor confusion and some delay which stopped the performance flowing fluidly. For me personally I kept rushing my lines from nerves of not fully knowing them and so I continually tripped over my lines which stopped the flow of the performance. We could have overcome this problem by rehearsing our lines more often so we could memorise them easier to make them flow better, on the other hand, we had to change our lines on the day of the performance since one of us almost did not make it due to serious illness, we had to change our lines round in order to fit this change and so on the performance we got muddled with the lines that had been cut and the new lines that had been introduced.

Another minor problem with our performance I believe was the chairs, although we had practiced placing them perfectly, the chairs can still be unpredictable and in one of our three performances one of the chairs did fall down. We could have tackled this problem by once again, practicing with the chairs more thoroughly or even choreographed the chair sequence so as to move and place the chairs perfectly so as to not let them fall down.

Another issue I think we should have addressed before the performance was the moving of the audience and the flow of the piece, the movement and scene changes were quite slow and I think we lost the energy during the scene changes as we re-positioned the audience for the next bit, also, I believe that in one scene, the dialogue was slow on delivery between us performers and it also lost some of our energy, this could also be contributed to the fact we had recently changed our lines and were still new to the new lines. We could have combated the lack of energy whilst moving the audience by maybe having some lines to say whilst the audience moved or even we could have started the different scenes earlier in order to counteract this lack of energy in the scene changes.

If we were given more time I would have liked to experiment with more ideas relating to the tank. For instance we wanted to experiment with messing with the audience’s senses. ‘The noise is horrific and the heat was very considerable, and the smell of cordite and engine exhaust fumes was pretty nasty’ ((Mark Dillon (2010) What was is like in a WWI tank? Online: http://www.bbc.co.uk/learningzone/clips/what-was-it-like-in-a-ww1-tank/12726.html (accessed 6th May 2013) )) although we had the sound effect of the tank playing throughout to give them the sense of the sound level, we only had this on low so the audience could hear our dialogue over it. We had, alternatively looked at the smell and feeling of being in a tank, we wanted to create the smell of a tank and its fumes which were not properly vented, we looked at the smell of petrol but we could not replicate the smell without using a highly flammable substance which we believed to be too dangerous. We looked at the idea of having a rag sprayed with WD40 in the corner, on the contrary we decided against this because WD40 is still highly flammable and the rag in the corner might have confused the audience to its use being there.

Furthermore, if we had more time I think we could have looked at making the audience more involved within the project, by possibly making them help us build the tank. They could have gotten a sense they were part of the creation process and understood what we were doing more closely; on the other hand, this would have taken a lot of careful planning since the chairs were tricky to place and even in our final performance one of the chairs slipped causing the tanks to collapse, if we had gotten the audience to build the tank maybe the chairs would have been more likely to collapse and we could not take that risk. Alternatively, we could have made them more involved by maybe getting them to dismantle the tank at the end, unfortunately, due to time restrictions we could not do this because we needed to get the audience back into the main room so they could see the other two performances that were similarly going on at the time.

The T.A.N.K: Part 2

Ben Middleton / May 7, 2013May 13, 2013 / T.A.N.K, Uncategorized

Once we had decided on creating the tank as a model, like the monument to be established on the roundabout at Tritton road, we thought about how we were going to make the tank. Several suggestions were tried from hay to cardboard boxes but we decided on using the chairs from the Grandstand because ‘materials themselves have been limited to those that efficiently make the general object form’ ((Morris, R (1993) ‘Anti-Form’ in Morris, R’s Continuous Project Altered Daily: The Writings of Robert Morris London: MIT Press)) the chairs replicated the tank in an easy, but still ambiguous way. Plus, we liked the idea of creating the tank out of objects that were already in and or left in the grandstand because, like the grandstand they had equally been forgotten about .

Since we decided to build the tank out of the chairs, we experimented with looking at the chairs already being there when the audience walked into the room, this worked well because at first the audience had no clue what it was, being just a pile of chairs and some netting set up in a specific way the tank still looked ambiguous enough that the audience would not understand what it was until the performance was underway and the use of soundscapes and dialogue would help them to understand what the sculpture was representing. Alternatively, we looked at simulating the movement of the tank’s caterpillar tracks with the chairs, we thought this image worked well and we decided to build the tank movement wise whilst the audience walked in.

Furthermore, we looked at how this movement was quite repetitive and we believed that each movement we made should be precise and repeatable; this is since the tank was quite mechanical we wanted to replicate that mechanical sense by making the movements accurate and in a form of repetition. We did this by using the whole group to move the chairs where two people would be in perfect sync with each other on each side to make it look like the tracks were moving perfectly; also, we would hold the chairs over the line of the other chairs to make it look neat and mechanical. We decided to add the mantra of the tank force ‘From the blood, through the mud, to the green fields beyond’ here since we believed that the mantra spoke of the goal of the tank and its forces.

Once we had established this much we wanted to look at how we could integrate the tank to the Grandstand, although the tanks were never really used or tested at the grandstand, however, we know there was trench training on the west common ‘Crenelated earthworks just south of the grandstand identify the location of a former training trench from WWI.’ ((Heritage Connection Lincoln West Common online: http://www.heritageconnectlincoln.com/character-area/west-common/64/description (accessed 25th March 2013) )) Additionally we found a picture in the archives on the first tank, Little Willie on the west common,

we can assume here that maybe the tank was brought to the west common to test out on the practice tranches to see whether it would be able to cross the trenches on the warfront. Even though the tank was never really at the Grandstand we still believed it to be a strong part of Lincoln’s history much like the Grandstand that had been forgotten.

The Transformation of the Tank

Gabrielle Ruth Evans / April 26, 2013May 11, 2013 / T.A.N.K

Research and Ideas

The Tank is a key aspect to Lincoln’s History. Made and built in Lincoln by Foster & co. This revolutionary invention was to change the face of war for ever. Named the ‘Little Willy’, its creator William Tritton owner of Foster & co, developed and tested his creation on the west common opposite the grandstand. As a group we took a trip to the Lincolnshire life museum, in which a life size model of the Tank was displayed. Looking at the tank and its dimensions really made me realise how big the tank actually was. This sparked our creative ideas into us defiantly creating a tank for performance. We did not know at first how the tank was going too reflected in performance. It could become an instillation piece, a piece in which the audience could get involved or a tank memorial? Another idea was that we could recreate a scene that took place in the Yarborough suite, in the White Hart Hotel, Lincoln. In 1915 Tritton and Wilson used this room to develop the tank and it was suggested using filming we could recreate project it on to a wall in the grandstand then in front of their eyes have us working and building a model tank. As a group we wanted to in-cooperate all of our research and ideas into one so from there we thought of building a tank using materials that could be found on sight, and create a structure in which the audience could experience what it was like be inside the tank, and to observe it from the outside.

T image (6) esting the Tank

Our first attempt of recreating the tank was in a small room in the University’s Village Hall. Built from tables and chairs, the structure was almost tank like. It was somewhat an abstract look, taken from pictures, paintings and the tank we visited in the museum. Visible and one of the most important components to the tank were the caterpillar tracks. These observations lead to a significant development during our second attempt.

Our visit to the site was different this time, because we had an idea to play with. But nowhere to put it, we had the idea of creating the tank outside in the paddock, but then as we went through the curtain in the weighing room it felt like it should be built there. Looking so bare, the room could be shaped into anything we wanted. It was a blank canvas ready for us to take over and make our own. The weighing room can be seen as a ‘space that is unfixed’ but is ‘responsive and molds itself to its occupants’ ((Govan,E Nicholoson, H & Normington,K. (2007). Chapter Eight: Making performance Space/Creating Environments. In: Making a Perormance. Oxon: Routledge. pg.106)). We made the space fit to our requirements, by using materials from the site to build our tank. With our idea, posed a question, what is stable enough for us to build a tank that would withstand audience members and us to go through it?

After lots of deliberation, it was suggested that we concentrate on the caterpillar tracks. We integrated our use of chairs from before to create the tracks. We found if we balanced one chair upside down on top of the other, It would look like a caterpillar track and to make it look more like the shell of a tank, we were to use army netting sourced from a group member to create the top. After choreographing our opening sequence over a number of weeks we looked at how the audience could be introduced to the space. Taking the chairs from their original state, stacked up into a corner could give the audience a nice image of history coming from the walls and the chairs. Taking Everyday objects created into this magnificent war machine.

Adding too this, we integrated articles ,diary entries found online and in the Lincolnshire archives’ to create a narrative; a journey for the audience to follow. We now have nearly a finished product that runs smoothly; the only thing we thought we wanted to add into it was how the Tanks took over the Horses in the War, which can be shown in the film and theatre production War Horse. Adding this towards the end of the piece would link it back nicely to the grandstand and move swiftly into the themes ‘Odds are Stacked’ group looked at. Also with the movement of Me and Callum slowly setting the room back to its natural state. It Shows the audience that everything they have seen has been put together, built by a team and a community. Uncovering the Tanks caterpillar tracks and resetting them back to their normal a pile of stacked chairs, lends itself to leave a mark. Similar to the marks we leave every time we enter the grandstand. The Building of the tank shell also links in with the grandstand being and empty shell, until you walk inside it and see it, in theory it is just an empty building waiting to be used, and not is ready to be given up on just yet.

T.A.N.K Part 4 – Smaller on the Inside

Callum Pepper / April 19, 2013May 10, 2013 / T.A.N.K

When it came to rehearsing our section, now that we had created the caterpillar tracks added some movement, applied some text to the movement, what should we do next? What more could do to give the impression that the audience were seeing a tank from the First World War? After a another trip to the museum of Lincolnshire life and reading more into what it would have been like for the crew inside the tank. The idea that we came up that we should place our audience on the inside of our caterpillar tracks, placing a piece of material over them like a roof and squeezing the audience together to give that Claustrophobic feel that they are inside this killing machine with no way of escape.

Inside a World War 1 Tank

The original Tank crew shared the same space as the engine. The environment inside was extremely unpleasant; since there was no ventilation, the atmosphere was contaminated with poisonous carbon monoxide, fuel and oil vapours from the engine, and cordite fumes from the weapons. As you can see from the video it was a claustrophobic space for someone to be in, although they were protected from any outside force, it was the inside that was more deadly. The crew themselves were only issued with leather-and-chainmail masks plus a helmet to protect their head against projections inside the tank. Gas masks were standard issue as well, as they were to all soldiers at this point in the war.

Steering a tank was difficult; it was controlled by varying the speed of the two tracks. Four of the crew, two drivers and two gears men were needed to control the direction and speed. As the noise inside was deafening, the driver, after setting the primary gear box, communicated with the gears men with hand signals, first getting their attention by hitting the engine block with a heavy spanner. For slight turns, the driver could use the steering tail: an enormous contraption dragged behind the tank consisting of two large wheels, each of which could be blocked by pulling a steel cable causing the whole vehicle to slide in the same direction. If the engine stalled, the gears men would use the starting handle – a large crank between the engine and the gearbox. Sadly many of these vehicles broke down in the heat of battle making them an easy target for German gunners.

Now that we had an idea of what we wanted to with the audience, we decide to apply some more text to our piece, this time it was instead of the tank crews motto, we were going use the a newspaper article form the Lincolnshire echo from 1965 entitled ‘Men and Machines’. The article itself was someone opinion on how we now relying on machines to do our fighting instead of an army.

“The improvement in machines far outstrips the improvement in a man as a fighter as so we become more and more mechanized”

Works cited:

www.firstworldwar.com/weaponry/tanks.htm (Accessed 14th April 2013)

www.bbc.co.uk/history/interactive/animations/mark_one_tank/index_embed.shtml (Accessed 19th April 2013)

Linconlshire Echo,Men and Machines,1965

Isolation T.A.N.K.

Stephenie Clubley / April 10, 2013May 12, 2013 / T.A.N.K

The T.A.N.K. group originally wanted to to represent the claustrophobic environment that the interior of a real tank would have created by performing to a small percentage of the audience at a time. We were going to create a tent-like structure of material in between the caterpillar tracks made of chairs to make the body of the tank. Three actors would have supported this structure while one performed inside to between 1 and 3 audience members, and the speaker would swap with one of those outside each time new audience members arrived.

This idea partly stemmed from a discussion about The Long and Winding Road, a live art project by Michael Pinchbeck; particularly the section where Pinchbeck wrote a one-to-one performance piece intended to take place inside a parked car that had been the center of the project. ((Pinchbeck, M (n.d.) The Long and Winding Road, Online: http://www.michaelpinchbeck.co.uk/installation/the-long-and-winding-road/ Accessed 10th April 2013)) We had information about the experiences of those trusted with testing the first tanks, including the dangers they were faced with, and we wanted to impart that information in a personal and direct way. Inviting the audience into our vehicle to listen at close quarters seemed like an excellent way to create the level of intimacy we were looking for. Continue reading “Isolation T.A.N.K.”