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Exhibition in London: Memories

15/6/2018

Here’s a selection of works by artists from the current wonderful Memories: there’s always tomorrow exhibition at St Pancras Hospital in London (UK).
The show was curated by the artist Jill Rock, and coordinated by Peter Herbert and Elaine Harper-Gay from The Arts Project, London.
As in the First Class Passenger Lists in the transatlantic liners of yore, the artists are in alphabetical order.
If a link isn't available via the caption, just click on the image.
Art is beyond life.
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- Phil Baird elongated line mind Bio - Phil Baird
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- Lorraine Clarke Cras and the Memory Keepers
http://www.clarke-art.co.uk

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- Jolanta Jagiello: MMM - https://www.axisweb.org/p/jolantajagiello/ http://www.apauk.org/jolanta-jagieo/ _____________________________

- Melanie Ezra
There are actually two artworks here. The torso is called We are All a Work in Progress. The shirt is called John, Alan, and Jane too. which is a reworking of a collective family memory from around 1955 in an attempt to connect with my own family tree. See also:
melanieezra.com

and below:
https://melanieezra.com/2017/10/29/sewing-circle-rethread/
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- Montse Gallego. The Tree: Memory is what links us to terrestrial life, to the sense of space and time and to all rational processes. Without it, we would only live in the present, discovering the world and its wonders at each and every breath, but making us incapable of survival. Memory creates and re-creates us constantly, adding pieces to its infinite puzzle every second. Being selective to avoid such overwhelming information, memory is also creative, building a different universe in each mind. That is why memory is both what unifies us and what separates us. In The Tree memory is presented in the form of pages from my diary being printed and blown up on different types of paper, joined together, painted over, written over, overlapping each other... These pages have transcended their primal purpose (personal reflections) to help me to find another type of memory that exists beyond me: the one of the archetypes and symbols, the one that belongs to the collective memory and in doing so, directly reaching the viewer. My own memories were not the subject of the painting, but they were the objects used to open the door : 'just forgetting, we are able to reach the essential knowledge'. http://hundredyearsgallery.co.uk/the-floating-world/ _____________________________

- Maria Lusitano: now, paint me now! the amazing adventure of 2 atlantean explorers See also: www.marialusitano.org. http://instagram.com/marialusitano http://www.dreameconomics.com/ https://www.instagram.com/marialusitano/ _____________________________

- Elspeth Penfold: There is a beauty in unravelling See also: http://www.elspeth-billie-penfold.com. https://instagram.com/p/Bj9wr2nHG2iRSsyC2GGidOB_e-aZTW3OxT-IjA0/ _____________________________

- Jo Roberts: Diary to Mimir. This is my diary. It was started when I was invited to exhibit at the Memories exhibition last autumn and it ends on the day it was hung. It includes musings, sketches, childhood memories, descriptions of what I experience during epileptic seizures - which I often refer to as “turns” - stories from mythology, medieval monsters, hallucinations, lots of mentions of plants and insects and a recipe for getting rid of plant mites. Some of the pages had bleach accidentally spilt on them which has meant the text has disappeared, rather like a fading memory. I decided to call it a Diary to Mimir because he was The Rememberer in Norse mythology. _____________________________

- Jill Rock: The Memory Clinic The outer layer is the world outside here seen as a collection of other people’s ideas on memory; then there are the objects which carry memory igniting them in our minds signified by the mirrors which are in fact images of things past reflecting back to us in the present. In this process we re-imagine and use them for ways to act in the here and now. The dance ball - I have always seen it as one of my symbols - multi-facetted, continually receiving and reflecting with a dark empty centre - Buddhist friends say that the dark vacuum at the centre is not a personal aberration, but apparently central to Buddhist thought – but not being a Buddhist, I have never gone along with the idea of the single identity thing. https://rbs.org.uk/artists/jill-rock http://cargocollective.com/JillRock/CV _____________________________

Here is a detail from this 3D artwork by Nicky Scott-Francis (with thanks to photographer Tom Carter for these two photos). See also: http://www.youtube.com/user/automaticbiroart and https://www.facebook.com/Nicky-Scott-Francis-automatic-biro-watercolour-art-701348280000551 _____________________________

Wonderful website

2/6/2018

Just catching up with Chris Lynn's wonderful website - I've been enjoying his Walk and Potomac series of films, and there are lots of other gems there too - a perfect antidote to staring at likes on the cellphone or mobile, as one walks, impervious to the beauties of the outside world.

Arts festival launch: Memories - There’s Always Tomorrow

6/5/2018

We attended a wonderful and lively party, to kick off the arts festival on the theme of memories, at St Pancras Hospital, London. It also was the occasion for the first public screening of River, from the new music/film Diversions, and the launch of the new book, in the countries of the mind.
I was invited by the artist Jill Rock, who, together with Peter Herbert and Elaine Harper-Gay from The Arts Project, had brought together for the festival an exhibition of varied, dynamic and colourful paintings and installations by eleven artists: Phil Baird, Lorraine Clarke, Melanie Ezra, Montse Gallego Reyes, Gloria Garcia, Jolanta Jagiello, Maria Lusitano, Elspeth Penfold, Joanne Roberts, Jill Rock, and Nicky Scott-Francis.
Claudette and I set up the equipment, which due to our inexperience, suddenly became temperamental. Fortunately, we were able to fix it, with some assistance. Our nerves had subsided by the time the audience filled the conference space. After the various introductions, I presented River.
I started with a randomised game that involved 12 short extracts from in the countries of the mind. These extracts were read by Phil Baird, Claudette Robertson, Maria Lusitano, Jill Rock and Nicky Scott-Francis, who were themselves randomly scattered in the audience. Originally I was going to toss a 12-sided dice, but I forgot where I’d put it (ironic, considering the theme of the festival: Memories: There’s Always Tomorrow).
Fortunately that morning (just in case of the unlikely event that I’d forget the dice) I had randomised the 12 extracts using weather data, so I used these numbers for the game instead. Astonishingly (and a genuine coincidence) the last extract turned out to be about River.
I explained that this music/film was inspired by the Thames.
In this music/film you don’t see the river all the time – but it isn’t forgotten, as it’s there throughout, in the music.
River is an audiovisual interweaving of memories, of finding wonder in the illusory everyday.

Recent performances and a new book

24/3/2018

On the 4th March I was the opening item at the Hundred Years Gallery’s Illuminations and Evocations show, reading extracts from in the countries of the mind, the first book in the scattering texts series. The vivid, large, humorous and energetic paintings by Ana Pallares framed other performances, including a lively song, wry readings by poets, and a concluding improvisation by KMAT, which ended with mysterious small objects rolling quietly towards the audience.
Last week we went to an amazing place (the Coronet Theatre in Notting Hill) and saw the highly evocative Quay brothers’ film Street of Crocodiles, and Comet, directed by Teresa and Andrzej Welminski: a magical piece of theatre using sound, music, dance, mime, light, old props of various kinds, mobile scenery, and IMAGINATION.
It was performed by a company, some of whom were in Cricot-2, the Tadeusz Kantor theatre group. Years ago I missed Kantor's Dead Class at the Riverside Theatre, so now it was a wonderful opportunity to see his kind of work, in a venue which is very strange, and ideal for it. I was so pleased to catch up on this amazing type of performance – as soon as we saw the buildings move, I knew it was going to be a phantasmagorical evening.
The Coronet’s bar is set around a baby grand piano, in a space which in itself looks like a surreal theatre set. Many of the floors in the place lean, as does this space, so you have to watch out in case your drink slides off the low table on which you have carefully placed it. The low lighting is provided by dozens of tea-lights illuminating various alcoves with peculiar arrangements of found objects – for example a strange toy, an ancient book lying open, a small sheep skin. A wall is covered in an array of old handbags, possibly left by accident, and another wall is covered in various small antique mirrors. We sat by a large old bed, covered in a patterned rug with a solitary cushion on it.
Altogether, with the film and the performance, an unforgettable evening.

Théâtre Volière: Marchland

11/3/2018

Went to an energetic and inspiring multi-lingual and multi-cultural performance at The Bridewell Theatre, London, on the 3rd March last Saturday.
Presented by the international Théâtre Volière company, as part of their Marchland season, in this performance the audience were invited to sit on the stage with the performers. This enabled you to be in the middle of all the action, including the extraordinary singing of Åkervinda, a Swedish vocal group, whose clear and luminous tones created an evocative and moving polyphony.
‘Marchland’ refers to frequently disputed frontiers, which the Théâtre Volière presents very effectively, with all the ambiguities such spaces at the limits display.
This type of performance is very much needed now, at a time when simplistic thinking and narrow factions are sadly increasing. The Théâtre Volière company challenges the dead weight of received ideas in a lively, stimulating and thought-provoking way.
https://en-gb.facebook.com/theatrevoliere/

BAFTA 70th ANNIVERSARY

22/12/2017

On Monday 18th December at 2.30pm we attended the 70th Anniversary of BAFTA, at its headquarters in Piccadilly. I was invited by Mr A.A. Reeves, as the David Lean Foundation had funded my doctoral research on Eisenstein's ideas on the audiovisual.
The celebration included a screening of David Lean's film This Happy Breed, which was shown on the large BAFTA screen, in their own cinema. In the programme was my text about a particularly moving scene from this film, which I'd explored from an audiovisual perspective, in my second book Cinema and the Audiovisual Imagination.
Mr A.A. Reeves of the David Lean Foundation told the audience the story of how BAFTA began, and the key role of David Lean's financial support in its creation, thanks to his extraordinary films, in particular the great success of Lawrence of Arabia.
it was wonderful to experience This Happy Breed on a big screen. For David Lean it was really his first film, after his collaboration with Noel Coward on In Which We Serve. This Happy Breed was based on a play by Noel Coward. Anthony Havelock Allan produced both films, and according to the other producer and director Ronald Neame, Havelock Allan heard his mother telling someone that her son had produced a film called In This We Breed.

Machines: first public screening

22/12/2017

The first live outing for Machines at the Hundred Years Gallery last night went very well - it was warmly received by the audience. This music/film, completed this year, is the first of three movements from Diversions.
Afterwards the artist Jill Rock performed an evocative incantation to the compass points, followed by a virtuosic performance by Ivor Kallin in his piece for customised violin and interpolated spoken words. A break for drinks followed, after which there was a solo performance involving T-shirts and citrus fruit by Mervyn Diese, then an inspired improvisation on the saxophone by Mr Jensen, followed by another break for panettone and drinks - a most convivial evening.

River world première at Hundred Years Gallery

19/12/2017

Here's news of an early première, tomorrow evening!
Mid-Winter Solstice : Rude Mechanicals & Guests
Thursday 21st December 7:30 | entry by donation
Hundred Years Gallery, 13 Pearson Street, London E2
Everyone is welcome to the second night of our Mid-Winter celebrations, featuring the legendary Rude Mechanicals & Guests. Celebrated radio personality and improvising polymath Ivor Kallin will play a solo (or perhaps collaborative) set of wild and furious viola and Glaswegian glossolalia.
Mervyn Diese performs Badger Kull, and to start things off a world premiere screening of composer, writer and filmmaker Robert Robertson‘s River, scored for large orchestra (on the soundtrack... not in the room).
Gabriella's festive pannetone and chilli brownies free with drinks.

Noi, Persone Speciali - We, Special People

14/12/2017

NOI, PERSONE SPECIALI - WE, SPECIAL PEOPLE
by Cristina Marchesan
Illustrated by Dennis Dracup

I've read this book, and I have much enjoyed it.
It's a very positive experience to read these texts by the various young contributors.
And the images make a very effective counterpoint to the experiences they describe.
There's a sense of delight there too, a pleasant surprise which makes one think about creativity in a different and stimulating way.
It's important to have a book like this at this time, when all kinds of prejudices are currently increasing with regard to people being falsely perceived as being fundamentally different from oneself.
http://www.lulu.com/shop/cristina-marchesan/noi-persone-speciali-we-special-people/paperback/product-23410769.html

Inspiring rehearsal at the Royal College of Music

2/10/2017

Delightful experience yesterday afternoon, at the Royal College of Music.
We went to an inspiring rehearsal of Beethoven’s Violin Concerto in D Major, with not one, but three excellent violinists, one for each movement: Emily Sun, Maria Gîlicel (who played a Stradivarius violin made in 1728), and Line Faber.
The acoustic in the Amaryllis Fleming Concert Hall is wonderful, and the playing (as often with top student orchestras) was full of passion, energy, vigour, and total commitment.
The conductor, Mark Messenger, emphasised precision in the rhythmic details, and made intriguing points (as for example how Beethoven’s silences are very different from Mozart’s silences), and generally he strongly emphasised the improvisatory qualities of this concerto.
(This reminded me how years ago a filmmaker had asked me, as a composer, what I thought of improvisation. I told him that for me, the best notated music should sound like the best improvisation imaginable).
I particularly enjoy rehearsals like this one, as in them you experience the actual progress of composition of the music, its separate parts, its assemblage. In this rehearsal we were vividly presented with Beethoven’s huge variety of orchestral colours in this concerto, and his melodic vivacity, harmonic daring, rhythmic force: all the inner workings of inspired music, and music-making.
www.rcm.ac.uk/masterclasses and www.rcm.ac.uk/events

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