red shoes performance-makers
and Browns Mart Productions present
Under Today
25, 26, 27 May
2012
5.30pm
Gosse St Park
Spencer Hill,
Alice Springs
Under Today is a contemporary, interdisciplinary performance which utilizes
dance/movement, media, live music and a soundscape composed of previously
unrecorded stories of the local Indigenous and non-Indigenous community, to
trace the points of tension, connection and loss in this town called Alice
Springs or Mbantua.
Under Today is a documentary of the Eastside of the river made up of a
series of layered stories, of voices that intersect, contradict and coexist in unexpected ways –
‘Eastside was never eastside in those days – our people used
to come and camp … stay there in humpies… we used to sleep outside all lined up
all us kids and all the grandmothers...’
‘The Italian people, I think we are very funny people. Like
the Romans. You know they build and then they destroy…'
Under Today
will be performed over three nights in May. The performances will take place in the dug-out dirt drain which provides a
pause between Gosse St, the last street on the
urban grid on the east side of the river, and the dramatic rocky outcrops of Spencer Hill. Here the
tensions between the built and natural environment are most keenly felt –
‘People used to get upset about the sites being destroyed by
the houses getting built. Nobody listened to them because they thought they
were just making up site as they went along.’
The audience will be
seated along the wide ridge of the drain which forms a natural ampitheatre with
views into the basin of the drain and across to the slopes and hill, which
avail multiple performance platforms and video projection planes, transforming
the exisiting surfaces and audience experience of the site.
Under Today
is a development of a collaborative work by performance-maker Dani Powell,
Alice Springs, and media artist Alexandra Gillespie, Canberra, performed in
Goyder Street Lane, Eastside for Shifting Ground (Art, Land, Culture, May 2007). The work was developed in 2009 with the
assistance of the Sidney Myer Fund, Arts NT and the Alice Springs Town Council
and previewed on site in October that year. This production has been produced
by Browns Mart and funded by the Australia Council for the Arts, Arts NT and
the Alice Springs Town Council with
presenting partner Araluen Arts Centre.
Under Today has developed with the contribution of many
creative artists along the way. Since the preview of this show in 2009 I have in
the past 6 months been developing the script with new oral histories, and the invaluable
dramaturgical assistance of Karen Hethey. Developments have also been made in
sound design with Damian Mason coming on board this year and in choreography
with Miriam Bond. We are delighted to have
Carly Sheppard join the ensemble for this performance along with the young
Tracey Webb and Monica Collins.
Under Today artists 2012
Dani Powell (animateur, writer, director) started
making performances in Central Australia in 2000. In 2001 she began a creative
partnership with Emily Cox which they called red shoes. In 2003 Dani
undertook a Post-Graduate Diploma in Animateuring (Theatre) from the Victorian
College of the Arts. That year she produced the
weight of a sleeping child, and upon
a river and then we might sleep against
the external wall of ACCA in Melbourne. Dani returned to Alice Springs to
continue red shoes’ productions and work with young people. She was Assistant Director
of Big hART’s Ngapartji Ngapartji production
from 2006-2009 and Community Producer of the project itself. In 2008 she was
the Artistic Director of the Opening Ceremony of Art in the Heart, Regional Arts Australia National Conference.
Alexandra Gillespie (video/media artist) works in
the nexus of media and visual art. Her practice includes video, photographic,
installation, interactive and collaborative works, in these works themes of
place and history are explored. Recent works
include Insulate the Future, 2010
exhibited at Gallery Smith, Melbourne, Collars,
2009, exhibited at Canberra Contemporary Art Space, Bathurst Regional
Gallery and presented at the International Symposium of Electronic Arts
(ISEA) Singapore 2008. Ningenneh Tunapry: we understand
media artist/designer for Tasmanian Indigenous gallery
2007, Tasmanian Museum and Art Gallery, Hobart. Alexandra
is currently a PhD Candidate, School of Art, Photography and Media Arts,
Australian National University, with a College of Arts and Social Sciences
Scholarship.
Damian
Mason (sound artist)
is a musician and sound designer based in Central Victoria, and has been
producing work for theatre, television, radio, installation and film for over
15 years. Damian has worked on several productions with the arts company Big
hART, including Hurt, kNot at Home,
Beasty Grrl, Radio Holiday and was composer, performer and musical director
for the stage show Ngapartji Ngapartji.
Damian also composed the soundtrack for the documentary ‘Nothing Rhymes with Ngapartji’
recently screened on ABC TV.
Miriam Bond (dancer/choreographer) has
worked as an independent performer, teacher and choreographer in Alice Springs
for the past five years. A graduate of the Victorian College of the Arts, she
has performed with companies and choreographers in Australia and overseas.
She is the co-founder of the Dusty Feet Dance Collective and also works as a
dance artist with InCite Youth Arts and Centralian Senior College.
Frances Martin (performer/maker) has a background in circus and
physical theatre. Before moving to Alice Springs she worked as a Circus Trainer
for Westside Circus in Melbourne and has been involved in the creation and
production of several shows with Westside Circus as well as the developmental showing
of Under Today and the Alice Springs
Cabaret (2007 and 2008). She has just returned from Europe where she
participated in the Interior Landscapes
summer school with the Institute International de la Marionette in
Charlevillemezieres.
Karen Hethey (dramaturg/ puppetry
consultant) is a freelance puppetry artist and animateur with a background in
professional puppetry, directing, clown, movement improvisation, site-specific multi-artform
performance installation, spectacle theatre, community performance and applied
Anthropology. Karen currently divides her time between professional
international touring commitments with Spare Parts Puppet Theatre (The Arrival), independent theatre
projects and her commitments as a core devising and design artist with WA
artists’ collective SWERVE. Her independent work has ranged from self-devised
solo performance work to site-specific performance installation, to directing large scale puppetry
productions. Karen has facilitated
workshops in puppetry manipulation, devising and construction in Australia and
internationally and has worked extensively in many cross-cultural
collaborations with indigenous artists in remote and regional Australia.
Kristy Schubert (performer/dancer) studied creative writing, literature
and dramatic performance and Flinders University with First Class Honours and
subsequent postgraduate research. She has worked as a freelance consultant in
Alice Springs, gathering community knowledge from Indigenous and non-Indigenous
people about various sensitive subjects (such as suicide and family violence)
and then composing these into various forms (such as posters, soundtracks,
animation, training packages, statistical charts and reports). She also has a
strong background in dance and has used these skills in many performances in
Alice Springs.
Fina Po (performer/illustrator) has a background in
environmental studies, philosophy and writing. Fina joined the red shoes
ensemble in May 2009 as an emerging performer. She has trained with
internationally acclaimed butoh performers Yumi Umiumare and Tony Yap in
Melbourne, where she has also trained in and studied Oki-do yoga. She has
previously been involved in coordinating the community-based Melbourne
Environmental Arts Festival and has also illustrated and written a series of
zines called Elder Cleft. Fina also
illustrated the props for Under Today
with botanical illustrations of native plant species.
Michelle
Goodwin (cellist) began playing the cello at the age of ten, and
received seven years of classical training in solo and orchestral
performance. After a hiatus of a number of years while studying and
establishing a career in anthropology, Michelle returned to the cello in 2012
to explore improvisation techniques and contemporary and experimental
styles of music through collaborations with other Alice Springs based
artists.
Tracey Furber Webb is Eastern Arrernte and was born in Alice Springs in
2004. She is the daughter of Corrina Webb and Craig Furber. Tracey grew up
moving around Tee Tree, Harts Range, Santa Teresa and Alice Springs. She is at
school at Irrkerlantye and is studying ballet.
Monica
Collins is an Eastern Arrernte girl and was born in 2004. Growing up in
Sandy Bore and Hidden Valley, she now lives in Alice Springs with her parents,
James Collins and Janice Turner. Monica is at school at Irrkerlantye and
enjoys ballet.
