NOTA : SHOWTiME Collection

NOTA (NOT, NOTES, NOTER (NOTA), NOT/A), towards a sometimes set of performance writing tools.  NOTA is a research framework for Open Dialogues that presses on the time, place and quality of notes in relation to live performance.  

The NOTA : SHOWTiME Collection is a selection of Open Dialogues notes from the launch of NOTA at SHOWTiME, Rich Mix London July 2012. The collection features notes made by Rachel Lois and Mary live and in public from a writing station on the SHOWTiME stage.

NOTA 150612 20.00 1

 START

OK, how do you want to start? Have I got a coffee moustache? Let’s not start there...

The stamp

Maybe start with the actual stamp... There is a lot in the gesture, or the action of the stamp. It is really old fashioned...

 It’s a standard stationery item in many ways, off the shelf. Only one part of it is customised - the word ‘NOTA.’ I tried to get the word ‘received’ removed from it too but then decided against it.

NOTA 160612 20.00 3

... This is graft. We are at a workstation, stamping documents. And it is work.

NOTA 160612 22.00 1

For me, it’s a process of thinking through writing, through mark making. The notes represent my thought processes.

Provisional, lightweight and ‘un-publishable’, the notes capture a particular insight. The particular invitation they make is important. As a form of conversation there is space for other people to speak.

The first of several NOTA publications is due out soon. It will feature some of the SHOWTiME notes specially selected and re-worked by Alex Eisenberg and John Pinder of Present Attempt and a choreographed interview transcript between Mary and Rachel Lois. 

Other manifestations of NOTA are here, here and here. 

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NOTA (NOT, NOTES, NOTER (NOTA), NOT/A), towards a sometimes set of performance writing tools.  NOTA is a research framework for Open Dialogues that presses on the time, place and quality of notes in relation to live performance.  

SHOWTiME is curated by Present Attempt. The July 2012 event  included Haranczak/Navarre Performance Projects, Present Attempt, Joseph Mercier, Mischa Twitchin and Penny Francis, Chloé Dechery, Rachel Mars and Rosie Kelly, Bill Aitchison Company, Lisa Jeschke and Lucy Beynon, Augusto Corrieri, Seke Chimutengwende & Friends, Yoko Ishiguro.

Open Dialogues is a UK collaboration, founded by Rachel Lois Clapham and Mary Paterson, that produces writing on and as performance. 

Month of Performance Art- Berlin

By Rachel Lois

I am part of the international Curatorial Collaboration Initiative (CCI) for the Month of Performance Art- Berlin (MPA-B) 

Programme B with Ying-Mei Duan and Elana Katz - May 22nd - Photo © Marco Berardi 2012

The CCI consist of an international panel of curators, theorists and artists who contribute to the production, programming, promotion and network development of MPA-B, with discussions happening in Berlin,  online via Wiki and Skype. The 3rd MPA-B is in May 2013 and the CCI November 2012 meeting will focus on the dissemination of authorship in performance. Join in, and contribute to the conversations via live written chat via the livestream between 11-17.00 CET 10 November 2012. 

Texts from the collaboration will be published on the MPA-B Text roll here, a selection of these will also feature here on the Open Dialogues blog 

Strategies for Approaching Repeating Problems

By Rachel Lois

Emma Cocker & Rachel Lois Clapham, Fatima Hellberg, Gil Leung, Andrew McGettigan, Francesco Pedraglio, David Raymond Conroy, Alex Vasudevan

Re — Rachel Lois Clapham and Emma Cocker, presented at Quad, 2012

Strategies for approaching repeating problems presents a series of performances, presentations and talks around the ideas explored in the exhibition, Accidentally on Purpose, at Quad. Taking the notion of a repeating problem as a starting point, invited artists, writers and curators discuss elements of their practice within this framework. Notions of recurring issues are explored from artistic and wider social perspectives; from difficulties inherent in language and communication; to the way artists and writers position themselves in relation to political events and wider social issues.

Re — Rachel Lois Clapham and Emma Cocker, presented at Quad, 2012

For Strategies for approaching repeating problems, Emma Cocker and I performed a new version of Re — an ongoing iterative project that essays the relation between meaning and intention, hesitation and purpose, and the visible and invisible states of not knowing within the event of practice. Re —  presses on two writers coming together to explore process, product and performance (of text).

More details on the event here or here. 

#networkwriting

A week of dialogue between Mary Paterson and Nathan Jones (Mercy Online) in relation to 'PERFORMANCE WRITING NETWORK.'

Starts on the Performance Writing page on Facebook (19/10/12)

https://www.facebook.com/performancewriting?fref=ts&filter=2

Continues on Netbehaviour (21/10/12)

More details to be updated soon

Thompson's Live - The Chris Goode & Co. Podcast

On Monday 5th November, Mary Paterson will be joining Wendy Houstoun, Dominic Lash and Chris Goode for the fourth of Thompson's Live series of podcasts, recorded at Stoke Newington International Airport.

The Chris Goode & Company podcast focuses on conversation around theatre and performance, poetry and music, arts and ideas.

More information on STK site
 http://www.stkinternational.co.uk/STK/STK.html

(And on 22nd November, listen out for Rajni Shah and John Hall)

Download the podcasts here:
 http://chrisgoodeandco.podbean.com/

Accidentally on purpose

By Rachel Lois

I am presenting a new performance reading at this event, below, in collaboration with Emma Cocker. 

David Raymond Conroy, I know that fantasies are full of lies, 2012

Strategies for Approaching Repeating Problems
 

Emma Cocker & Rachel Lois Clapham, Fatima Hellberg, Gil Leung, Andrew McGettigan, Francesco Pedraglio, David Raymond Conroy, Alex Vasudevan

Forming part of Accidentally on Purpose curated by Candice Jacobs and Fay Nicolson and produced in collaboration with QUAD

www.accidentalpurpose.net

6 October 2012, 11am – 5pm

The Box, QUAD, Market Place, Derby, DE1 3AS

Strategies for approaching repeating problems presents a series of performances, presentations and talks around the ideas explored in the Accidentally on Purpose exhibition at QUAD, connecting the exhibition to wider contemporary issues in cultural production and discourse.

From difficulties inherent in language and communication to the way artists and writers position themselves in relation to wider social issues, such as education and the public sphere, this event will identify an array of current or ever-present difficulties, discuss their perception from different positions and consider whether notions of progress or return are clichés or inevitable fates.
 

Rachel Lois Clapham & Emma Cocker
Artists and writers, Rachel Lois Clapham and Emma Cocker will perform a new version of Re — an ongoing iterative project that essays the relation between meaning and intention, hesitation and purpose, and the visible and invisible states of not knowing within the event of practice.

Fatima Hellberg

Curator Fatima Hellberg will be performing Wooden Eyes, Why Are You Looking at Me? a series of reflections on productivity and anxiety, starting with an autobiographic narrative, told from the perspective of a pencil. Turning to American economist Leonard E. Read’s ‘I Pencil’, alongside a number of other neo-liberal management treatises Hellberg explores the use of the fable and mysticism as a way of containing, and coping with vulnerability in management.

Andrew McGettigan
Recognising that we are in the midst of a strong push to reform education, writer and researcher Andrew McGettigan asks What is Education For? Responding to the fall in recent GCSE and A level exam results and the rise in University tuition fees, McGettigan will probe recent shifts away from state administered and funded provision towards private educational operations that favour competition, fees and test outcomes.

Francesco Pedraglio
Francesco Pedraglio is an artist, writer and co-founder of the art-space FormContent. Pedraglio will be performing Writing methods for hands and windows, creating a direct link between internal and external space this performance reflects on the mechanics of storytelling in relation to the subjectivity and perception of shape and form. Speaking and writing directly in a foreign language, Pedraglio faces the problems associated with ‘making sense’ while delivering a story to an audience. 

David Raymond Conroy 
Artist David Raymond Conroy will be performing I know that fantasies are full of lies, a talk that combines Roland Barthes' Reality Effectwith McDonald’s advertising photography to explore imperfection’s role in creating a sense of authenticity. Using mobile phone pictures and YouTube clips, Conroy will map out what roles humility, fallibility and disappointment might have to play in seduction, desire and capitalism.

Alex Vasudevan
Dr. Alex Vasudevan is a Lecturer in Cultural and Historical Geography at the University of Nottingham. His research focuses on radical politics in Germany and the wider geographies of neo-liberal globalisation. He also works on the spatial politics of contemporary art. Within Strategies for approaching repeating problems Vasudevan aims to consider the question of failure and loss in relation to urbanism, the aesthetics of politics, and activist communities.

Gil Leung
Gil Leung is a writer, artist and curator based in London. She is Distribution Manager at LUX and editor of Versuch journal. She writes for Afterall and other independent publications. For Strategies for approaching repeating problems, Leung has been invited to chair the final panel discussion with other participants.

For more information about the participants download this PDF

Please email Jillc@derbyquad.co.uk to book a place.

Visit the QUAD website for details www.derbyquad.co.uk or call QUAD Box Office:   01332 290 606 www.accidentalpurpose.net

Will you NOTA?

Open Dialogues will be presenting NOTA as part of Oh Seminar at Villa Romana, Florence in September 2012.  As well as note-taking in response to events, we will be presenting a performance lecture and a series of small, conversational invitations to artists and audience members.  We would like to invite you to draft a note for us to share with seminar participants on the subject of NOTA.  

All notes will be treated carefully, credited and enjoyed.

Thank you

Mary and Rachel Lois

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About

NOTA: NOT, NOTES, NOTER (NOTA), NOT/A is a framework for research that presses on the time, place and quality of notes in relation to performance. It is produced by Open Dialogues towards a sometime set of performance writing tools.   Oh Seminar is a three day artist-led programme that questions writing, reading and the seminar as forms of knowledge transmission; curated by Mirene Arsanios and Valerio Del Baglivo. 

www.villaromana.org