One thing I have learnt whilst studying different types of experimental performance is that a lot of performances appear to be based around the audience. We looked at the work of Marina Abramovic and liked her ideas but we felt there was something missing. Her work is very much based around her whereas we wanted to base our performance around our audience. We wanted to experiment with how we could make the audience feel and what techniques we could use to manipulate their feelings. I looked deeper into the work of Blast Theory and saw that they always included their audience and made their work so the audience member would have an experience rather than just watching a performance. I found Blast Theory’s A Machine to See With particularly interesting because it led the audience member through a story about a bank robbery where the audience member is at the centre of the action. Although we weren’t going to base our performance around the idea of a phone call we still wanted the audience to come away with a new experience and this led us onto the idea of taking them through different stories and into a different world.
Claire Partington
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