Transfiguration

Olivier de Sagazan

 Painter, Sculptor and Performer.

Photo by L'echo de la Presqu'ile

Olivier de Sagazan is a transformation artist, this means that he incorporates painting, sculpting and performing in his performances.

His performances would be classed as Post-Dramatic performance as is isn't the conventional type of performance due to the cross over of the three different types of art.

The basic principle of Savagans' performance is the use of clay.

He uses clay and paint  to build layers on his face and body. This allows him to disfigure his body and change his appearance dramatically. In his videos you see him throw clay and paint on his face and he starts to shape it. He also puts the clay over his hair to create a completely different look to his body to create a performance about identity and trying to find who you are.

 'The human visage/hasn't yet found its face/ and that it behoves the painter to find it in its place.' (Artaud.A,2011)

In his performances he starts to destroy the layers and reveals his 'animalistic human who is seeking to understand his real nature.' (Channel Zero, 2016) 

His art work creates a sense that all humans have different sides to them, whether that be an animalistic side, a physical side and a spiritual side. His performance work allows the audience to see what being 'normal' could be if we as a race weren't so secretive about our primitive ways.

Savagans work is different to most of post dramatic work I have come across, it is a raw performance that doesn't hide the inner animal inside of everyone. His performances have got their own emotions, in some cases you could tell that he was sad, frustrated, relaxed, happy. The way he incorporates the three arts together creates a stunning piece of work to watch. His work is performance art, and in some ways it can answer the question what is performance art.

Performance in this case is a way to show people what could be, should be or has been. Performance art is a way of expressing an emotion, thought, physical problem and telling everyone about it. This performance piece for me does exactly that as its poignant message makes you think about your own self and how you can relate to such a strange yet effective performance.

Solo Performer

Hetain Patel 

Hetain Patel was born in Manchester but is of Asian decent. He is not known to follow the traditions of his culture and also feels that his identity should come from inside and not what he looks like on the outside. 

'I am interested in using my own body as a site of identity and interrogation' This quote from an interview suggests that he is questioning his own identity and trying to find himself by producing many different works of art. 

Hetain Patel crosses the boundaries of normal stereotypical performances, he combines art with theatre and live theatre meaning that digital media is also used within his performances. He has performed a variety of performances, including:

- Durational
- Photography
- Media
- Drama
- Visual Arts
- Live Art/Body Art

Patel doesn't consider himself as a performer but does as an artist. Patels' work is usually produced for theatres and galleries but have also appeared in private tours, Television and in local communal areas such as estates and public toilets.

As a young boy Patel was intrigued by Spider-Man and idolised Bruce Lee. Since then he has explored and performed in pieces that have been inspired by the stance of Spider-Man and the strength and skill of Bruce Lee. Patel believed that he was creating a cultural superhero cross over when he acted as Spider-Man in some of his performances.

Letter to Peter Parker 2015

Hetain Patel used his love for Spider-Man as a soul subject for his sculptural piece about Spider-Man.
Over the course of 4 months Patel wrote a thank you letter to 'Peter Parker' these letters where then transferred word for word onto a hand made Spider-Man costume that had been cast from Patels' body. The words from the letter then formed the costume.

Patel used his own upbringing as the main story for Spider-Man in order to relate Spider-Man to himself. Patel thanked Peter for covering the identity up with a mask, because this 'diverts the attention from his primary aim of disguising his skin colour' He also thanks Peter for the inspiration of self portrait photography as this inspired Patels' 'own existential practice of self portraiture'.










Patel used the crouching position that Spider-Man adopted in the films as a basis of the sculptures stance. The famous Spider-Man posture also ties to Patels' family physically to india as this is a native position.







During interviews Patel has said that he always starts with the same idea for a piece. He will start with a simple idea that branches off into different performances. Therefore his idea could be Bruce Lee, he would then create a media piece for this idea. Then he would start with Bruce Lee again and then create a Photography piece about it and so on. This meant that he could look at the same idea but with a fresh perspective and it meant that no piece would be the same even though the subject was the same.

Its Growing On Me 2008

This durational performance was about how different people are treated depending on how they look. Patels father was an immigrant from India in the 1960s and was treated differently because he was indian and looked like a stereotypical indian with a beard and moustache. Patel however has grown up in the UK and therefore has a Manchester accent, he is also mostly clean shaven, this means that he was treated like a british person. Patel then set out to do a durational piece of work that showed his change from himself into becoming more like his father. Patel completely shaved all the hair on his face and head and took a photo of himself everyday, at the same time, same place, same clothes for 4 months. He then showed the outcome with the use of a time lapsed video.

Patel noticed a considerable difference in how people treated him once he had grown his facial hair. He started to be considered more as an indian than a british person. He also was given discounts in indian shops. However as this was a dramatic change from what he originally looked like he was also given some negative reactions. For example he would start to be called a peodophile by random strangers from across the street. He wouldn't be able to drive his car without people making racist comments. This durational performance allowed him to live as two people and see how it changed the way people treated him in his natural form and him as his fathers form. 

Overview:

Patel is an artist who explores his true identity through the use of media, performance and art. He is open minded and his work shows what his attitudes and values are towards society in this day en age. Patel is intricate and believes in everything he does which makes him a great person to watch and interact with. He may not consider himself as a performer, but his work is Performance Art. 

Stanislavski

The basics of Stanislavski:

He was of Russian heritage and born in the 19th century, he came up with the theory of naturalistic acting.

Throughout Stanislavskis' career he spent a lot of time devising a type of acting that could either be classed as a system or method. He believed that good acting was natural acting, and wanted to find a connection between emotions and physical appearance. In this respect, audience members were told every detail, whereas with Bertolt Brecht we notice an opposing style of acting. Brechts' thoughts of Stanislavski was that the audience members 'hang up their brains with their hats in the cloakroom'.

 Throughout the rehearsal process up until the main performance Stanislavski worked of three methods and used these methods as the basis of acting.

Stanislavski thought that getting to know the piece of text you are working on in detail was the best way to start a production.

Step 1: Mining the text

Mining the text is all about four things,
- The first reading
- The text
- Mental Reconnaissance
- Given Circumstances

These four sections allow an actor to successfully engage in their performance text and understand the context and what the motives of their characters are.

'This moment of your first meeting with a part should be unforgettable... The loss of this moment is irreparable because a second reading no longer contains the element of surprise so potent in the realm of intuitive creativeness.' (Merlin.B, 2007, 57)

This quote explains the importance and highlights the speciality of the first reading as this is the first look into a character and in this first reading you bring your character to life for the first time and learn with the character as the reading goes forward.

The text is when you as an actor begin to add characteristics to a character. You begin to develop the voice and depth of your character bringing them to life, bringing them from the written word, to the spoken word.

Stanislavski started to move away from the conventional way of directing actors, instead of telling the actors exactly what they needed to do,  he started to meet up with the cast and allowed them to input ideas. He believed this method ensured that fresh ideas would be inputted and also it allowed the entirety of the cast to have a good understanding of the piece as they would dissect the text together.

The given circumstances is what stanislavski described as the body of a performance. This included:
- The story of the play
- The Who, What, When, Where, How
- The characters background
- The actors and directors interpretation
- Stage pictures
- Set details

All of the above help to bring a performance together. They create the main body of a great performance to enhance the quality of a performance. These different attributes of a performance can change the way a performance is watched or interpreted.

Step 2: Embodying the role

Embodying the role is bringing the character to life in practical rehearsals. This means that scripts are dropped and the actor is vulnerable but is free to do any action they please. The actor now has the opportunity to create a full body persona of their specific character and play with how their character acts in different situations.

Stanislavski believes that there is an action, then reaction, then decision and finally the next action.

This basic four step situation is how he believed method acting worked successfully. By creating this the actors knew what happened next but also had the freedom to act how they thought fit.

Stanislavski was concerned about the truth. He wanted each performance to be truthful and believable.

'He believed that a sense of truth marked the difference between craftsman and an artist' (Merlin.B, 2007, 115)

This shows that Stanislavski values the importance of truthful acting and that method acting is proper acting, meaning that this is he true way to act.

Step 3: Approaches to Rehearsal

The approach to rehearsal is how you operate with others during the rehearsal process. Rehearsing with others makes a performance more real as you then begin to feed of what the other persons character is, making the connection between characters stronger and more truthful. Allowing the audiences to fully understand the characters relationship with each other and what is happening in the scene.

Stanislavski is an iconic performer and his theories within the industry have been studied and practiced for many years. His work has inspired generations of performers as well as creating controversy with that of Brechts work. Stanislavski created a type of performance that was new and truthful that audiences liked, however as the times move on, the more informal way of performing has become popular and post dramatic art has increased in popularity.

All in all Stanislavskis method is a type of performance but it does not however, explain what performance is and it is not the definition of performance.

Performance 2

Hitchhikers guide to the family

The second performance i went to see was called the Hitchhikers guide to the family, a one man autobiographical performance written and performed by Ben Norris.
The performance was about a journey to discover who his dad really was, and resembled a type of pilgrimage. The journey that takes place began in Nottingham and ended in Wembley. The use of digital media was used as a point of focus throughout the performance to aid the audiences understanding of the journey.
Also the use of lighting was effective as when the mood of the performance changed the lighting dimmed or even blacked out, the stage was then lit with just hand held torches and LED push lights. Physical theatre was also used throughout the performance, it was used to act out certain movements that happened during the journey made. This gave the audience a sense of what it was like to embark on a journey that Ben Norris took.

Watching this performance made me think about 'what is performance', because the two performances so far have been very different but are both classed as performances. This performance was very personal and in-depth, it spoke truth that parts of the audience could understand and relate to, thus making this performance more poignant. The performances were both performed at a high standard and captivated their respective audiences.

A performance is something that attracts the attention of people from all different backgrounds and brings people together. A performance can be anything from a singer in a street to a full production at the London theatre.

(Pictures by Joe Price)

LED lights were used to mark out the middle line of the M1 and Ben acted around them, either turning them on and off depending on the scene.

They were also used to represent a map of the places that his father had lived in. Turning the lights on and off when he had visited them.

The lights became part of the performance and each single movement of a light had a purpose.

 The props on the floor gradually become more apparent as the performance goes on because each item that he took out of the bag had a story behind it.

The use of physical theatre in this part was to demonstrate to the audience how he got to London by being a passenger in strangers cars. The exhaustion at this point is clear to the audience and its also apparent that Ben is determined to get to Wembley.

The use of digital media throughout the performance reflected on what he was doing on stage. The signs that were created told the audience what location he was in.

The digital media was made up of a collection of pictures and videos that were taken whilst on the journey. The videos were of the car journeys that took place and others were of Ben waiting to catch a lift and being rejected.


His performance was about 'Love and Motorways' and reviews from the stage say 'A modern pilgrimage ... a complex and emotional ride.'

What is Performance?

What is Performance?

Many people ask 'What is Performance' and many people answer with a highly sophisticated interpretation on what performance is, yet we have never stopped to think... What actually is performance?

I will be writing this blog throughout my time at university studying performing arts. Within this blog i shall include detailed analysis of performances that i have seen throughout the year, rehearsal notes, pictures and annotations, along with the occasional inspirational ideas that i get from watching performances around the country. 

Performance is not something that can be fully understood, instead it can be accepted and welcomed into society. Performance has brought enemies together, it has made bad times good and it has even helped solve issues across the world. We under estimate the power of performance and take it for granted, but if you stop and remember what you have seen in your life, you'll see that everything in one way or another is a type of performance. 

Can "Performance" really be summed up in a university students blog? Can one student come up with a generic answer to the question that is set? Maybe my time at university will help me to discover the truth about performance and eventually ill be able to to say, "Performance is..."

So far as a naive student my knowledge of performance is slim compared to others. I have little experience with the industry and still believe that a perfect performance is the best performance. If i were to answer 'What is Performance' at this current time, i would say that it is when 1 or more people present something to others. I believe that performance is a show to inform or entertain. I know that performance is something that some people are afraid of and that it takes a lot of courage and confidence to achieve. 

In order to get a sense of how deep this question is, i asked the smartest person i know. Google. I gave Google the word 'Performance' This would allow me to see the thought process of 'Google' and also allow me to see what can be related to 'Performance'

My findings:

When typing 'Performance' into Google, i began to soon realise that Performance is not all about Performing Arts, it can be about Business, Sport, Music, Art, Management and Drama. The single word Performance has multiple meanings and branches, so no matter what we think performance is, someone will always have a completely different theory than you, hence why Performance its self cannot be explained but a generic formula can be worked out. To be able to present one idea that is lots of ideas at the same time.

Performance Companies 1-3

Fact File

For the first presentations of the year we were put into groups. We then had to research a performance company that we didn't know anything about and present it to the class. The three companies that were researched were:

- Chicken Shed

- Paper Cinema

- Zoo Indigo

This blog entry will outline the facts of these companies, what they do, what they have and are performing, the techniques used within the company and the themes they cover in their performances. 

Chicken Shed

- It was founded in 1974 and based in Southgate London

- They are an established charity

- They are funded by over 85 small companies and organisations as well as trusts and donations

-They use performance to celebrate diversity, culture and social indifferences

- They welcome over 200 students in per annum

- Excluded from mainstream education

- offer BTEC, Foundation Degree and BA level programmes

- Also have a vocational programme for 14-25 yr olds

- They cover knife crime, sexual awareness, racism and many more aspects that can affect the community

- They use digital media, dance, music, drama and physical theatre through their performances

- They are currently performing Kindertransport, Night of the living shed and Tales from the shed.

Paper Cinema

- It was founded in 2004 and it is a touring company

- They are a team of professionals in their respective areas and all help to create live art

- They use animation, music, film and theatre to present their work

- They travel internationally to show their work to audiences from all different cultures

- Live film is an integral part of their production of performances

- They are currently touring the Odyssey and later on in the year Night flyer.

- They have a wide fan base and turn dramatic work into contemporary pieces of art

- They use illustrations made from paper and card to portray their stories to the audiences 

Zoo Indigo

- Founded in 2002 and based in Nottingham

- They are an anglo-german contemporary company

- They perform performances regionally, nationally and internationally

- They perform in varieties of locations and create multidisiplinary performance works with artists with different variety disciplines

- They use new technology digital media, the use of humour, popular music and the reprocessing of  cultural texts
- The company contrasts everyday life with the extreme things in life
- The performances that can be seen are Celluloid Souls, No Woman's Land and Flat out. These pieces are the most current that the company has done.

So from these three presentations i learnt that no theatre company sticks to one of the steps mentioned in blog 'Performance 1' . Every company is unique and has a specific quality that draws audience members in, however, we can now start to understand that part of 'What is Performance' is that performance is interpreted in different ways with different people. So therefore, at the end of this blog i conclude that a performance is when someone is witnessing someone else doing an action that doesn't belong in the setting their in.

Performance 1

Shakespeare, his wife and the Dog

Throughout my course I will be seeing a lot of different performances so that I can start to understand 'What is Performance?'. 

During a practical session we were told about the different steps that separate Acting from Non Acting. They were the following:

Non-Matrix Performance is when a stage hand becomes involved in the performance but isn't actually performing. For example if a technician walks onto the stage during a performance and fixes a light, this is classified as a Non-Matrix Performance.

Symbolized Matrix is when a performer is bringing something onto stage but are not a character during this time. For example an actor could bring on a chair and then once they are sat on the chair they then become the actor. Symbolized Matrix is when the performing is not acting at the time of the movement.

Received Acting is when the audience acknowledge that people on stage are acting however they do not have any information on the character, just the fact that they know they are acting. For example cast members called 'extras' come under received Acting because the audience know that they are acting, but know nothing about the characters themselves.

Simple Acting is when an actor is portraying a character at the basic levels of acting. So they could be playing a character in a situation doing an action. Simple acting is make believe. This could be described as someone playing charades as charades is close to simple acting.

Complex Acting is when a combination of emotional and physical performance is interacted. This is called layered acting. Layered acting is a build up of all types of acting put together. This allows the actor to create a character that the audience can fully believe in.

These five steps of acting help to differentiate between the performances that are closer to non acting and the performances that are closer to acting. Allowing us to think what makes a performance, a performance. 

Shakespeare, his wife and the dog was very much a complex acting performance. It consisted of two actors throughout the entire performance. These two characters were husband and wife, the performance was all about the struggles of living with a writer like Shakespeare. Although the concept of the performance was very simple, in the respects that there were only two actors and little staging and lighting, the story itself was very thorough and complex. 

Whilst watching the performance i noticed that there were small movements that were kept the same. For example each time the actors sat on the chest down stage left, they always sat on it backwards away form the audience. In my opinion this made the spoken word seem more mysterious then it actually was. The underlying health conditions that were covered in the piece were subtle but made you empathise with both characters.  This piece is not everyones cup of tea but on the scale of acting, this was an extremely in depth and well rehearsed piece that has inspired me to explore the heights of emotions and also to capture the audience with just the simplest of staging. 

Reviews

Reviews of this performance were very positive which is no surprise. The performance was produced by bated breath for the Fringe Festival in 2014 and since has gone on a UK tour because of its popularity. "Wonderfully written and beautifully acted" says Broadway Baby. "A joyous celebration of language" says the list. Positive reviews for a great performance, a great tribute to Shakespeare and i would definitely say this is a performance to watch.