Recollections (Waygood @ Northern Stage)

Recollections by Dee Shaw
Friday 25 September - Saturday 17 October 2009
Reception: Thursday 8 October 6-8pm

Dee Shaw‘s work deals with the twin concepts of time and memory through tiny fragments of pottery found in various locations and embellished with stitches to imagine the full story.

“For many years I have collected fragments of pottery found on the ground pushed to the surface by generations of busy earthworms. These pieces were once part of a plate, cup or saucer used by people in their day-to-day life

“Most of history is studied through archaeological remains of grand houses and castles, but these little shards are a snapshot of the continuing domestic arena of everyday people. I have used silk thread to embroider an imaginary design of what the rest of the pattern would have been, creating another memory or reflection”
Dee Shaw

This is part of a series of exhibitions here at Northern Stage featuring art from Waygood, an artist-led gallery and studios undergoing a major redevelopment to create a new cultural venue on High Bridge in the centre of Newcastle opening in 2010.

Pictures from South Africa

Members of the Northern Stage team have been in South Africa taking part in an exciting project. Like last year's South Africa trip, we've kept up with goings on through a series of blog posts. Mark Calvert, Creative Participation Co-ordinator, tells us about what South Africa meant to him:

"So, we're here... we've travelled 10, 193km, 6333.9 miles or 5504 nautical miles (according to infoplease.com!). We've grumbled about our economy seating, we've sprayed expensive aftershaves in Dubai airport, we've wandered zombie-like past 'win a car' stands - the cars to be won being a Lamborghini Gallardo and a Bentley GT Convertable. We've been introduced to South African theatre, by way of Zamuxlo Mgoduka's epic production of Aunt Rose. We've seen 12 productions in a day: a mixture of incredible theatre and song, dancing that made you want to get up and dance yourself and poetry, by Sonwabo Meyi, that made you question why you can't find a 'voice' like that. All of the above, mixed with the journeying around the townships and seeing incredible hardship, bring into sharp focus the history of South Africa and make you question how and why apartheid was allowed to take place.

We've also met 20 South Africa artists that make you take a look at yourself and your skill base, your honesty, courage and what you put down on your CV. 'Can act, can sing, some movement skills' - these artists can act, sing in close harmony after a matter of moments, dance as if they've rehearsed a routine for weeks and approach text with such courage and skill that it makes your head spin. This may all sound like I'm overegging the flan a little but go, be in a room there and you will experience something that is missing from many rehearsal rooms in the UK, a belief that something good will happen.

At this point we've been in The Barn, a studio space in the Port Elizabeth Opera House, getting on for two days. In eight days time, we're having a showing, a work in progress, a sharing. No matter how it's wrapped up, its going to be a show. People are coming and they're going to sit in the dark and watch something... that to me is a show. So what are we going to do? How are we going to do it? How are we going to showcase the talents of these 20 people? How will we show them at their best? Lots of questions, not enough answers.

So we sit down in Angelos, a bar/restaurant on Parliament Street, and take stock of what we've brought with us. Erica and Naomi have brought with them a selection of speeches from Shakespeare to Martin Luther King and a play by Athol Fugard called 'The Coat'. Andy and I have brought ourselves. We feel like we should be at the back of the class. We sit and talk, talk some more and then a little more over a couple of Windhoek's. This becomes the template for the next 10 days: rehearse in The Barn, then after the days rehearsal, retire to Parliament Street to talk and plan until it was time to sleep.

So, every morning we're due at The Barn for 9am. While going to The Barn, it becomes de rigeur to purchase a coffee. (The coffee is something else entirely... coffee, milk, hazelnut sauce, chocolate pieces and cinnamon, topped off with whipped cream plus more chocolate pieces. It's a meal in itself, all for £1.) Then on arrival: warm up, a muscle-wrenching bone breaking journey via contemporary dance, traditional African dance, break-dance and boxercise. The weight should be falling off us but due to the mixture of luxury coffee, and fried chicken, our weight remains, hopefully, in stasis. The fried chicken is another revelation - once you've tasted it, you quickly need another fix. After a few days on this diet of coffee and chicken, we all state piously that we are in need of a meat and caffeine-free day but the lure of chicken leads us to the extraordinary lengths of KFC. Only Andy can find enough willpower to abstain from the constant cravings but finds temptation in scrambled eggs and any variety South Africa can offer.

I digress, after warm-up we start to explore different texts and exercises, and this continues for most of the first week. We try to explore as much as we can in the time we have, we share ideas and techniques, laugh and collectively enjoy watching some high quality stuff. It's turning out to be a brilliant choice by me to attend. Everybody takes part in everything - from readings of Shakespeare to imagining you have a plate for a face! We start to see the shadow of a piece, this could be really good - better than good... brilliant.

Andy then runs a design workshop and Erica, Naomi and I could really just pack our bags and leave. The workshop consists of different staging: thrust, traverse, in-the-round. How to move chairs, how not to move chairs, how to make a set just from chairs - not good if you're cathisophobic. It moves on to using 5 metre lengths of thick elastic, we work in groups and make stars, trees, elephants and roundabouts. There's a question and answer session then Andy is given the keys to the city. It becomes apparent that stage design is an element that the artists really want to know more about but also confirms that you can make a set just from what you have in the room. Very clever. Andy is the man of the hour, until Kev Tweedy, the lighting designer turns up.

On the Thursday of the first week we read through The Coat, a play devised by the Serpent Players in 1966. The piece is about a man who is sent to prison for political crimes. All he has to send back to his wife is his coat. The wife is told to 'use it'. The piece is pure Brecht - improvisation and discussion, improvisation and discussion - and behind it an apparent easy carelessness. It seems at all times completely improvised but is meticulously scripted. We all sit down and listen to 'The Coat'. Wow, its good. Twenty pages of great theatre. There's a discussion afterwards about South Africa, the struggle, peoples experiences of the last forty years. It's an eye opener and a privilege to be in the room. So we end the day on a high and go and celebrate with a Windhoek and some talking and planning until it's time to sleep.

Over the next few days we try and decide how best to use The Coat, which speeches to use and how to use The Barn. We piece together a show, continue to work on speeches and we, we being Erica, Naomi, Kev, Andy and I, are taught to dance, a dance that will eventually become the opening of the show. Erica and Naomi are working on some rather cool South African dance. Andy, Kev and I are placed in the 'men that can't dance' section for a contemporary medley. Bongi, the choreographer for our piece, weighs up her options - there are five men stood in front of her, each a dancer in their own heads. After some thought, she creates an epic piece of dance... about 15 seconds in length. There is some consternation amongst our team about the length of our section but this soon becomes a post-script to the more important matter of how to shimmy. This is where Kev Tweedy comes into his own.

We continue to work, discuss and piece the 'showing' together and in no time at all it's Wednesday night and we're plotting the show. We have a technical rehearsal Thursday and perform the piece to an invited audience Thursday night. There is an electric atmosphere during and after the piece, and we all feel that we've witnessed something incredible. It's been a remarkable two weeks. I feel privileged to have been part of this process, it's been one of the most affirming experiences I have ever had. Sonwabo Meyi says 'words are weak' when trying to sum up this time we've shared. I'm inclined to agree.

We leave on Friday afternoon from Port Elizabeth, have one last South African coffee and start our twenty-three hour journey home. I'm looking forward to going home but, without trying to sound too sentimental, will miss the people I've met and the experiences I've had. It leaves me with a lot to think about. "

The Story of The Coat (South Africa)

Members of the Northern Stage team have been in South Africa taking part in an exciting project. Like last year's South Africa trip, we're keeping up with goings on through a series of blog posts. Erica tells us more about her experiences:

"On the second day of our workshop, we brought in some copies of a play called The Coat, devised by a group of actors in South Africa in 1966. I noticed it in a collection of Athol Fugard plays, and was rather amazed by it. It was scripted and directed by Fugard from a series of "theatrical experiments" that the recently formed Serpent Players were engaged with at the time. The Serpent Players later became very famous for the plays The Island and Sizwe Bansi is Dead, both starring Winston Shona and John Kani. John appeared in the first performance of The Coat. The group lived in New Brighton, a township close to Port Elizabeth. In the early 60s they were known for producing modern classics such as The Caucasian Chalk Circle and Les Justes. None of them were allowed to perform for a mixed audience. When they did perform, they were frequently raided and their papers and scripts confiscated. Inspired by Brecht, they started to play around with coming in and out of character and a conversational style designed to wrongfoot, seduce and challenge their audience.

The Coat tells the story of a coat which was sent home to New Brighton from one of the many trials in Cradock (in the north of the Eastern Cape) which condemned political prisoners to long sentences, often on Robben Island. A sentenced man hands the coat to a woman who is visiting her accused husband. He doesn't know the woman, but he asks her to take the coat back to his wife and tell her to "use it". The play wittily and disturbingly unpicks what might or might not have happened when the coat was returned to his wife - did she use it? Did she give it to her son to use? Did she sell it? Through these stories, the actors (who took the names of characters they had recently played in order to conceal their identities from the authorities) paint a vivid and moving picture of life in a township.

We read the play together and were all very excited by its possibilities. It is very funny, but also asks for great characterisation and sensitivity. It was first performed to an all-white audience in the Hill Presbyterian Church (we pass a sign for this every day as we walk to the Opera House) , who had asked to see a sample of the work of the Serpent Players. Many of the group comment on how the play still has something to say now about life in the townships and we are all struck by how powerful it could be to revive it at the Opera House, which still has a largely all-white audience.

Over the new few days we played with the text - trying different ways of staging it and trying to understand how each scene works. In the second week, a remarkable thing happened. Nomhle Nkonyeni, a very distinguished and brilliant actress who was in the original cast of The Coat, met with me and then agreed to come into rehearsals. She guided us and challenged us and was a wonderful and inspiring presence in our room. It was a bit like having John Littlewood herself coming to see how you're doing with one of her scripts. Nomhle was incredibly generous to spend time with us and when we put an extract of the play into our final showcase, it was a great honour to have her in the audience.

We'll write more about the work we did as a group, and the final show in which all the Northern Stage team did a little dancing... but thats enough for now."

South Africa Update

Members of the Northern Stage team have been in South Africa taking part in an exciting project. Like last year's South Africa trip, we're keeping up with goings on through a series of blog posts. Erica updates us on her experiences this year:

"We've all found it quite hard to write about our experiences here because it has been pretty intense and very absorbing. So you might need to wait until we're home before we manage to write the whole story. However, here's a little flavour of what we've been up to.

We started our workshops last Tuesday and met the group for the first time. There are several actors, a couple of writer/directors, two hip hop specialists, four choreographers and a singer/actor, so quite an amazing set of skills around the room. We started by asking everyone what they do and what their key strengths and weaknesses are. I was struck by how boldly they all spoke about what they do, happy to say "I am really good at..."; a wonderful self-belief that would be unfamiliar at home. And yet underneath that we have discovered a lack of confidence in quite a different way - a lack of belief maybe that their work will be taken seriously.

We played some games together and spent some time setting ground rules - most importantly that we are here to learn from each other and share skills and techniques - which seemed to go down quite well. We were all nervous; it's quite something to come all the way across the world and try to communicate what you do, and it's no small thing to to open up to complete strangers in your second or in some cases third language!

Naomi led a very powerful writing exercise, getting us to complete simple statements such as I believe, I hope, the world is...etc. Then we asked everyone to perform each others. I think we saw more straightforwardly heartfelt acting in the afternoon than most of us ever see! It was rather amazing and a great way to get to know each other. Mark introduced a game with tennis balls and names which was to prove quite a challenge throughout the fortnight, not helped by the fact that I really can't catch... In the afternoon we introuduced some Shakespeare, which was very new to most of the group. Immediately we saw some real results - people really throwing themselves in. We were surprised that, just like at home, most people's first instinct is to impersonate an Elizabethan actor - but once we got ourselves rooted in 2009 South Africa the words really took off. It was a great first day.

Too much to say. I have to go now because today is our last day and we have to finish making our showcase, but more soon about the rest of the process."

More from South Africa

Over the last couple of weeks, members of the Northern Stage team have been in South Africa taking part in an exciting Summer School project. Like last year's South Africa trip, we're keeping up with goings on through a series of blog posts. Stage Manager Andrew Stephenson reported back to us about his 'interesting' journey:

"Leaving Newcastle was a little daunting as we were setting off to a country that I for one felt that I knew very little about, to work with a group of professional artists of whom I knew nothing about. I met Mark (Calvert) at the airport at 11:00 am on Saturday the 22nd of August 2009 - this was to be the start of a very long journey, the length of which I think we had both under-estimated; I am taking the liberty of speaking for Mark when I say this, it was probably the longest day of our lives .

So we are checked in, got through passport control and the usual machines that beep and scan you, and after our first airport wait fulfilling the obligatory airport obligations like spraying a few aftershaves on each other and trying on a pair or two of sunglasses its 13:30 and time to fly in our united Emirates Boeing 303-777 bound for Dubai . We settle in to our seats with still quite buoyant spirit at this stage, Mark has the window seat but he does allow me to take the odd glance through it to look at the tiny world 36000 miles below. After watching a couple of movies, devouring the inevitable airplane food (lamb curry that arrives perfectly packaged in a little rectangle plastic box accompanied by some sort of chocolate thing in a small plastic round box and a few other bits in variously shaped plastic boxes), hurtling through the skies at about 560 mile per hour it takes us a mere 7 hours to reach Dubai where we land and disembark.

After passing through another set of beeping machines and having our passport photos sniggered at, we are in Dubai International departure lounge for our second airport wait. It is the middle of the night, I am not sure of the exact time as to think in three time zones (British, Dubaish and South Africanish) is beyond me so I let Mark take charge of the timings; I do know that this time we have about four hours of waiting. More aftershave, a few applications of expensive rejuvenating eye, face and hand creams, a pint of expensive lager, a walk around, another expensive pint and a cheeky Burger King Chicken Royale later and it's time to get on the second flight.

We are now 13.5 hours into the trip. boarding the plane and being ushered past the business class seating area with the business class people sitting in their fully reclineable armchairs does dampen the spirits somewhat when you know what's waiting nearer the rear of the plane, the economy class with its seating arrangements that are designed for the shorter and narrower-than-average human being - we find our seats settle in and before you can say Jumping Jack Flash we’re heading for Johannesburg. More movies, some rather uncomfortable upright sleeping, a chicken curry for breakfast and 8 hours later we are in South Africa, you would be fooled to think that we had made it to our final destination at this point, but no we still have to make the final flight to Port Elizabeth or PE as it is also known as.

It's now about 21.5 hours since we left home, we have to check in at the British Airways desk as we were unable to check straight through at the begining of the journey, however this does give us a bit of welcome variation on what had become a waiting lounge routine. Checked in and what’s a few more hours waiting here or there, we get the final flight to PE. By this time I have to say I my international exploring spirit was ebbing, my conversational skills had hit rock bottom, my eyes were too dry to read, my battery on my Nintendo DS Lite had run out, I felt dirty and smelly after having on the same clothes for what felt like two weeks (I would suggest popping a few clean things in ones hand luggage so that a costume change can be executed if anyone is make the same trip in the future). I managed to get the window seat for this flight - we flew over the most amazing landscape it looked like baked clay so dry, vast and lifeless which had been folded, gouged and scraped to make one of the most expansive and inhospitable looking habitations imaginable. I did wonder how Bear Grylls would get out of the middle of that alive.

We arrive at PE airport about 27 hours after leaving Newcastle, more beeps and then we head for the carousel, our spirits are lifted to see Erica (Whyman) and Mark Lloyd waving at us through the glass in the arrivals lounge as we wait for our luggage, and we wait and wait and wait... the bags have not made it to PE. This was not such a huge problem as it could have been as they are put on the next plane which will be landing a few hours later, long term disaster diverted , short term disaster not diverted, as clean clothes for the show we are being taken to see in one hour would have been a godsend. We are taken to our apartments and freshen up the best we can with what we have, its not the end of the world and it was a great pleasure to be able to go and see our first South African piece of work which was performed in the Port Elizabeth Opera House, a grand old theatre which actually pre-dates Newcastle’s Theatre Royal by about ten years. It’s too late now to write about the show and do it justice now, so I will sign off for the night and will send the next instalment soon."