DIY training by artists for artists

This 2 day workshop examined issues around the use of personal material in public performance. At the end of the sessions the 12 participants published this list of 'distillations' from discuaaions that had taken place. I was originator, facilitator and recorder of this workshop. This project and its outcomes influenced and shaped the direction of my PhD project.

30 distillations
from ‘heart of fire, head of ice’ 18 & 19 June 2005

I want to be ruthless not precious with personal material
All artists are storytellers – telling their own or stories from personal perspectives
I look for a live shape to work that’s planned
Subjective experience as content carries the potential to mean other things
My work is more than just about myself
An internal experience seeking external expression
I am finding a way to mediate the personal
I put my body on the line and take a risk
When I feel I have pushed myself through resistance or fear the work is real
Making the private public involves intimacy and immediacy
I take responsibility for the image and the completion of the image
I turn experience into something meaningful thats not just by example, that’s really honest, that’s really polished for the elevation and framing of the experience
I control the framing of extreme expression
My unchanging body is always in existence
Performance is the place I push out my ugly parts & rhythms to become validated; echoing or parallel to similar unacknowledged parts in the audience.
I plan in the unplanned
I have to believe what I am doing
At times I need to cover or layer over, screen or disguise naked truth in my art for the protection of
Others implicated in that truth
I translate myself into new potentials of meaning
I control and manipulate the meanings of my own body
Each personal, relative body being particular, carries its own risk, potential and range of meanings
I speak from the authority of lived experience that can be trusted (or is worth trusting)
I wait for the distinct, separate images and ideas that occur at moments when my mind can access the subconscious
My art is finding ways to exist as who I am and to belong
My art is an attempt to communicate myself – how far do I go with it
Taking something personal and making it universal means placing the personal image in the right context
Unmediated outpourings can sometimes be powerful and effective
We are all experts in our own personal experience
It’s important that the work is bigger than me
If we have each other