world of work

Chris Goode and Jonny Liron recently performed a piece at the Nightingale Theatre in Brighton, called World of Work. they invited people of all kinds of artistry to submit a card for the performance, from which they would do that thing they do, and received 62 of them. here are the specifics of their request:

There are no formal restrictions on what a card might show, except that we do not want to deviate from the 6″x4″ dimensions and we would like the designed element on each card to be on one face only, with the reverse left blank. Cards might show, for example: text to be read, images to be interpreted or recreated, instructions to be followed, notation to be sung / played / performed, found materials to be responded to, any combination of these, or anything else you can think of along these sorts of lines. Any kind of text / graphic / score / stimulus, however proscriptive or indeterminate, is welcome. As well as textual instructions to be printed on a card and followed in performance, you could also send instructions for designing a card or otherwise securing a design — not a card but a meta-card, in other words: this might be useful if, for example, you wanted somehow to leave the precise content of your card partly to chance or a randomized procedure, or if you wanted it to be somehow responsive to the day or place or moment of performance.

here's the card i mailed them:


to read a much more eloquent text from Chris about this project, and see more of the cards, go here: Transductions and here: Thompson's Bank of Communicable Desire.

nature is a whore

i made these drawings a little while back as part of the development process of a short perfomance Chris Goode (a legend-in-the-making) produced for and performed at Manchester's international queer festival, Queer Up North, by the title of "Where You Stand". Jonny Liron and I had the privilege of taking part in developing, discussing, working on and thinking about, what the work was to become.

It was performed at the Mill in Bradford, and at Queer Up North very recently. in amongst a lot of stress i managed to forget to write about it here, and i'm really sorry if there were anyone here who might have considered going had they known. there'll be a video of it though, sometime soon-ish, which i'll post.

Rest in peace Lee Alexander McQueen

i'll miss you.

worst fantasy

Timberbrit, a modern opera about Britney Spears and Justin Timberlake, was written by a Yale doctoral student and is being adapted into a fully staged version. The songs were inspired by slowed down versions of Brit's songs, which tell, "a tragic tale that imagines Spears' last concert, in the final hours of her life. Timberlake returns after a long absence to win back Spears' love, but in the end she chooses the audience's love above all else."


source: npr

weaklings

i was in london at the beginning of this month to see Dennis Cooper and Gisèle Vienne's theater piece "Jerk", and to meet the people up above in the photos and more. all these photos were taken by Dennis, the first are from just before "Jerk", and the last picture is the backstage monitor of the show. i'm the fluorescently pale one, and the one behind me is the kind gentleman who let me crash with him for the duration of my stay.

"Jerk" was one of the most powerful things i've ever seen, and my jaw is permanently dropped at the insane talent of the sole performer, Jonathan Capdevielle. here's a clip of him in french, though we saw the english version:


here's Gisèle talking about it, in english:

Hey Mathew

some months ago Chris Goode used this drawing of mine from this series of drawings for the performance piece he created together with Jonny Liron, Cis O'Boyle and Jamie Wood. Hey Mathew is about anarchist writer Paul Goodman and the early death of his son Mathew. i was too ill to go see it, but apparently people were turned halfway out of their minds by it, which makes me very envious. it was performed in Bradford and London. here are some screengrabs with the image and some more info on the piece:

Roddy Hunter 3

Gisèle Vienne + Dennis Cooper

I Apologize

Roddy Hunter 2

Roddy Hunter