Under the vaulted sky and Liquid gold is in the air
- Submitting institution
-
Middlesex University
- Unit of assessment
- 33 - Music, Drama, Dance, Performing Arts, Film and Screen Studies
- Output identifier
- 1528
- Type
- I - Performance
- Venue(s)
- IF: Milton Keynes international Festival, Cathedral of Trees, Milton Keynes.
- Open access status
- -
- Month of first performance
- July
- Year of first performance
- 2014
- URL
-
http://eprints.mdx.ac.uk/31331/
- Supplementary information
-
-
- Request cross-referral to
- -
- Output has been delayed by COVID-19
- No
- COVID-19 affected output statement
- -
- Forensic science
- No
- Criminology
- No
- Interdisciplinary
- No
- Number of additional authors
-
0
- Research group(s)
-
-
- Proposed double-weighted
- No
- Reserve for an output with double weighting
- No
- Additional information
- Under the Vaulted Sky was an hour-long promenade performance with cast of 100 people set in the Cathedral of Trees, an arboretum planted more than 40 years ago replicating the exact footprint of Norwich Cathedral. It had another, extended life as a video installation, Liquid Gold is the Air which was completed following the live performance. These works continued my longstanding fascination with groups of intergenerational professional and non-professional performers, combining this with another perennial interest in the natural world and its relation to human intervention. In this case the investigation of presence, ritual and procession was enhanced by walking on the site’s ancient ley line.
Creating the work took place through an artist residency programme, involving local dance groups and individuals as performers who contributed to the creative process. Considerable time was invested in building an awareness of each other’s presence, a shared sense of movement and trust in the shared attending. Participants across generations needed time to feel at ease, to be active as contributors and to achieve the difficult task of embedding the movement deeply in the body, allowing each moment to be experienced deeply and creating an atmosphere that could envelop audiences.
Site-specific work presents specific challenges – changes in weather and audience behaviour can distract. Maintaining the attention over an hour-long performance that was critical to the atmosphere was achieved by developing a strong sense of attending to one another, being present, aware and sharing a place of expressive fluidity. Across the nine performances this developed significantly, and it was important that the impermanence of the project was offset by the legacy represented by the collaboration with filmmaker Roswitha Chesher, Liquid Gold is the Air, a video installation also focused on issues of presence, attending and awareness.
- Author contribution statement
- -
- Non-English
- No
- English abstract
- -