Asking people questions

I am interested in thinking about care as an aesthetic, choreographic and political practice. As a negotiation of constantly fluctuating needs, capacities and interests. I am particularly interested in care that is disengaged, hostile, reluctant or otherwise complicated and problematic.

Through this research I am examining the physical performances of care calling on knowledge from somatic dance, nursing and kink. As a thread to connect them I am looking at how people care for still, passive bodies.

I am approaching this research with the idea of configurations, which could refer to arrangements of elements in particular forms, or (in computing) to configuration files which create the initial settings for a computer programs, and sometimes provide tools to modify those settings. 

 

There She Lies Motionless (2016) by Francesca Cavello & Hamish MacPherson is an exercise in compassion, vulnerability and power, sitting somewhere between, workshop, performance and the every day practice of giving and receiving care. Loosely based on the work and life of Caroline Thomas, a woman who has simulated illnesses for over 30 years as a part of her volunteering commitment to the Casualties Union. There she Lies, Motionless is a setting for mutual, physical interaction where the action of caring for, with and about someone becomes choreography and the grammar for the imagination of unforeseen solutions. Shown at Manifesta 11, Zurich (2016).

 
 
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Non Existent Activity (2017) Doors open every 30 minutes welcoming each person for an hour long stay, hovering between a hangout, a one-to-one performance, and the last place on earth. Guests becomes hosts, for guests who become hosts, in a three hour chain of holding and caring. Nothing needs to happen. But something certainly will. Developed with Paul Hughes and Mira Kautto. Photo by Joel Porter.

 

“Down in the basement there’s Hamish McPherson’s Nonexistent Activity Outside The Capitalistic Time in which you can alternately relax and minister to the relaxation of others (if Ulysses was ever becalmed, this is where it happened). MacPherson succinctly underpins all that is going on upstairs by suggesting that if we don’t care for each other the purpose of the arts has lost its way. “

Nicholas Mimms, Swallowsfeet Festival 2017

NO CLIMAX YET (2018) by Hamish MacPherson with Antonio De La Fe, Kimberley Harvey and Paul Hughes. A series of overlapping, one-hour performances of passivity and activity, movement and stillness. These vary from wrapping a limp body to giving an anatomy lecture; from exhausted, wild dancing to asking the audience ‘What shall I do next?”. Over six hours, four performers assemble themselves in ever-shifting configurations of ones, twos, threes and fours. The 14 one-hour performances overlap so at any one time there are two performances taking place - merging, contrasting and cohabiting the space. Changing their costume, lighting and scenography, they draw the audience in to different worlds of care and intimacy - from sex club to salon to mortuary, and things in between.

“NO CLIMAX YET brings an exquisite group of artists together in an unexpected collection of performative and choreographic actions.”

Paul Russ, Dance4 Nottingham, UK

“A deeply satisfying, and highly contradictory experience – to spend an hour with it is to be both gently cocooned and totally undone all at the same time. It can sometimes look casual, but you better believe it’s serious.”

Lauren Wright, Siobhan Davies Dance London, UK

“Experiencing it made me feel at once involved, exposed and kept at arm’s length. At times it was dark, at others frank, at others extremely gentle. At all times it was hypnotic and swallowed you into it.”

Lara Tysseling, The Yard London, UK

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It is urgent that we take our time (2019) was selected by the Centre for Contemporary Art, Derry~Londonderry to be part of URGENCIES a group exhibition that “engaged with the present moment of rapid change and uncertainty”. The looped 1hr 20 minute film shows a split screen with two scenes of wrapping or unwrapping different people in fabric. A series of overlapping performances of passivity and activity, movement and stillness. See how different bodies are negotiated, roles switch and the cycle of dependancy and attention goes on and on, before the viewer arrives and long after they leave. Image: CCA Derry~Londonderry & Simon Mills

 
 

STILL LIFE is an interview-led zine that delves into the worlds of care, choreography and kink to explore pleasure, passivity and power. It’s is about relationships and configurations in which one person is still while others are not. Or where one person is passive and others are active. It’s about how we put ourselves in other people’s hands. Or how we are put in other people’s hands. It’s about care and power and vulnerability and agency. And other things not so clearly named. It’s about the different kinds of knowledge that people have about their own and other people’s bodies. And the kind of philosophical and political understandings woven into that knowledge.

“Consistently impressed and intrigued by this excellent zine: not just some incredibly acute thinking about what performance can do, but also what, as a format, a zine can aspire to do. Highly recommended.”

Chris Goode, Theatremaker

“A small gem of a magazine”

Maartje Nevejan, Filmmaker

“Enlightening, funny, odd and just brilliant to have around”

Robbie Synge, Choreographer

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