my new year

We all wait until a new year arrives to say out with the old an in with the new, January is the start of the calender year but for most of us it is not the start of a new year in our lives. I have just started a new year, my 27th year on this earth and my body knows that something is new, my gut tells me that something has changed. I once had a conversation with a woman who I admired, we spoke of the many women we have been and are yet to become,I don't believe that we evolve through our changes to become better women but I know that each women serves a purpose. The woman I have been has informed the woman I am today.

Its been a while...

It's been a year since my last post. I wondered for a while if I had forgotten how to write, how to put the pieces together, how to express myself. As I sit here trying to say something my writing muscles struggle. I know that if I don’t say something soon they may seize up all together. I don't know exactly what it is that I want to say just yet, maybe it is that I am back, that I am trying and that I didn't disappear. I ............................ This is the issue that I face, I am thinking, I hear the words that I want to type but I have began to self edit to such an extent that there is nothing left to say. I worry that you will read this and see too much of me. I just imagined seeing you at an event and seeing the awkward look in your eyes, because I have been a little too intimate, shared a little too much of myself, allowed myself to be vulnerable and open to you. I have told you now, prepared you for what may come; This Blog may contain fragments of me. Pieces of me. I am a little excited.

Goodbye to that space

I am struggling to start this; I know what I want to say but I don't know where to begin. Is it important that I give you some background? Do I need to become objective and present an argument from both sides so that you understand why this has happened?

I'm not going to.

The Studio Theatre has been pulled down, this isn't strictly true; The Studio Theatre has moved and is alive but there is a corpse that has been standing as a soulless reminder of a body that was once full of life, I know that soon all that will remain will be dust and memories.

I fell in love at The Studio Theatre (I want a T-shirt stating that), I fell in love with performances by Stacy Makishi, Peggy Shaw, Third Angel and others that I remember vividly but cannot place their names. I fell in love with the sensation of being in that space, sharing it with people who shared similar interests, open and unguarded I fell in love with my partner during a season there.

Endings are always linked with beginnings, today has been bleak for many artists in loosing funding and as The Studio Theatre H-block building physicalises our losses, I think of funerals and the idea of coming together at a time of loss. I hope that this will be the response that we as artists take.

I find myself lost for words, I guess i just really wanted to say goodbye to that space.

Embodied Knowledge

Today marked the end of my taught sessions on a module called Embodied knowledge, it also marks the end of my taught sessions with my fellow MA students. It's been an emotional and touching day. One of my colleagues spoke of finding herself and allowing herself to be seen; I remembered looking back on a session, the 1st session that I really saw her and how it had an effect on me; we were spending time in a space and allowing one and other to be observed, I had become agitated by the way I felt that I had to behave like a performing chimpanzee, I had become a caricature and everything that irritates me about performance (while trying to do the opposite). She came into the space and sat, she commanded my attention; her eyes spoke of fear and determination, I know that this was not a performance it was a demand however; it was an essential part of the process.
I want to say thank you for this shared experience; the overpowering level of hormones in the room gave me the freedom to be honest in a way that may not be required in my future practice. We were united in our gender and liberated by the understanding of our bodies, the loss of embarrassment and in the knowledge that we were safe in each others company.

so here's to many more beginnings and endings, the continuation of learning and making sure that the knowledge becomes embodied.

Tasks

This week has been a week of tasks or the handing over of tasks; I handed my tasks over to my lecturers at Leeds Met Uni this week. I have been working on these tasks since October, they have given me sleepless nights and distracted days. I have enjoyed them, been frustrated by them and at times just given in to them.
This blog is born of a task that began 6th Feb 2011 (see The Epiphany Broken by Light), this is not a task; it is simply me mulling over a few things.