melbourne performance: mad, bad or simply disobedient

The psychiatric view is that all human beings are neurotic, who sometimes become psychotic. That is, a clinical distinction exists between mild mental illness such as anxiety, and the severe mental impairment prompted by delusion and hallucination. For those who have experienced both, three recent performances examined this cusp between the everyday insane, and total insanity. Unsurprising then, was that lurking beneath each performance was an incapacity for coping with the perplexities of love.

mag & bag

Playwright Barry Dickins personifies La Mama theatre's historical trajectory. He has been belting out scripts in Carlton since Betty Burstall's tenure. Two middleaged women confront one another over a hot teapot. They sit at a table in a kitchen reminiscent of an archaeological dig into Australia's recent past.  In residence there is chookwire and linoleum, Bovril and Milo, two VB stubbies in a fridge and walls decorated with articles from the defunct Herald newspaper. Mag, the more sensitive of the two and apparent servant in this relationship, is dominated by Bag who, when her authority is threatened, retorts with acute expressions of the C word that are intended to inflict severe mental distress. Isolated and alone, each woman only has the other for company. But their relationship is defined by a violent bickering that Dickins satirises with characteristic mischief. During an apparent truce, Mag reveals a birthday cake she has baked for Bag. Momentarily, an opportunity for an expression of intimacy arises between the two women. But Mag cannot resist pushing Bag's face into the soft sponge and their tumult resumes, this time with renewed ferocity. A yearning for an Australia long forgotten that permeates Dickins' writing has been criticised over the years. But watching Mag sitting on a child's swing while whistling, is to appreciate the reverie embedded within Dickins' play. Performers Carmelina Di Guglielmo and Maria Portesi require special mention. Playing clowns of European type, the counterpoint between Dickins' Australiana and its Dadaist impulse is a rare dovetail between Viscount cigarettes and commedia dell' arte. Emphasising the violent frailty that characterises this sadomasochistic relationship would elicit from Mag & Bag a surprising vulnerability, and accentuate its comedy

something blew

A particular demographic exists south of the Yarra river, one that finds artistic expression at Theatreworks. Minus the hip bohemianism of the inner city, this demographic nevertheless extends as far as the Bellarine peninsula. The title Something Blew has about it the benevolent aspect of a pleasant, off-shore breeze. But a rising swell prevails in the reconfigured Theatreworks space as a stunned bride stands petrified before an opening night full house. Absolutely perfect, consorting behind this bride is an eager line of performers partially concealed by a curtain. Something Blew begins with one female performer gracefully wrapping the foregrounded bride in cling-wrap. Meanwhile, her fellow performers congeal throughout a space lit with consideration and care, and begin to explore the metrosexual relationship as it manifests in 2010. There is male upon female, female upon male, female upon female, and male upon male embrace and sexual innuendo. While in-between each copulating couple there staggers a hairy man cross-dressed in a second bride's gown. Overall, the dance is pretty, slick, and evenly choreographed. Allowing the stage picture and an interpolation into the language of theatre to communicate meaning, each dancer is free to tantalise the audience with modern dance and its assumption that it must be abstract, and beautiful. But when Something Blew systematically explores the turning points within a permanent relationship, it resembles an eisteddfod. Simply expressing romantic love, marriage, childbirth, disenchantment, and seperation is a worthy strategy, but it must be developed beyond an exercise designed to express the complexity of intimate human relationships. For example, why do some women express love for a partner who is systematically abusive ? Alternatively, what compels a father to murder his children as an act of revenge against their mother ? Insane love is the common term describing such inexplicable acts. When Something Blew delves into this area, the underworld it explores is precisely expressed by the shrinking physical stature of each dancer, combined with a cavernous line of low lying ultra-violet light. Sent insane by not knowing how to love, the confusion that characterises metrosexuality is accurately represented. An enthusiastic company with more self-belief than life experience, 2nd Toe Dance Collective and their production of Something Blew leaves quite an impression on its audience, and this augurs well for their future. 

schism

Returning to La Mama, the geographical division between Melbourne's northern and southern suburbs is reflected in Melanie Bainbridge's short monologue, Schism. As part of La Mama's Explorations season, Bainbridge's script is directed and performed by her sister, Pippa. She sits behind a moody lectern and is accompanied by obsolete computer monitors. Some are blank, while others contain grainy images of laboratory rats, viral magnifications, and other troubling imagery. Bainbridge relates a tale about the potential for science to be a positive force when confronted by an ecological crisis. She then adopts a German accent and implies personal involvement in acts of ecological terrorism. The resulting ambiguity created by this 'schism' is integral to the developing narrative, as it remains unclear whether the audience is witnessing two separate characters, or an evolving psychosis upon the part of one seriously disturbed female scientist. The recorded voice of a policeman intervenes, and it becomes clear that the German accented character has committed a terrorist act, and suicide. The tale ends with the identity of the narrator unresolved, and the mystery is enhanced. Love, or a lack of such, is a critical aspect of any relationship between two people. The same applies to a relationship between two parts of one person's psyche. Loneliness, isolation, and the stress upon those involved in positions of scientific responsibility, can have serious consequences. In a world beset by an actual ecological crisis, Schism is a relevant examination of personal vulnerability, and an entertaining performance. Developed further, it has the potential to make a powerful statement about mental illness, and its consequence for a society made vulnerable by over-indulgence, inaction, and ignorance. 

Mag & Bag: Performers, Carmelina Di Guglielmo & Maria Portesi. Set design, II Collective. Set construction, Italiano bros. Stage management and lighting operation, Frank Italiano. Production manager, Carmelina De Guglielmo. Lighting design, Bec Etchell. La Mama, Oct. 27 - Nov. 7, Melb. 

Something Blew: Performers, James Andrews, Ben Hancock, Tyler Hawkins, Rebecca Jensen, Madeleine Krenek, Emily Ranford, Frankie Snowdon, Adam Wheeler. Lighting design. Rose Connors Dance. Costume Design, Chloe Greeves. Sound Design, Alisdair Macindoe. Dramaturge, Luke George. Project Management, Moriarty's project. Direction & choreography, Adam Wheeler & dancers. Theatreworks, Oct. 27- Nov. 6, Melb. 

Schism: Performer, Pippa Bainbridge. Recorded voice, Liz McColl, Jo Anne Armstrong & Tim Ferris. Music, Tether. Film, Dean Blackwell. Costume & signboard, Clare Davidson. Stage management, Gemma Arnold. Writer, Melanie Bainbridge. Director, Pippa Bainbridge. La Mama Explorations, Oct. 28 -30, Melb.

melbourne festival 2010: the raft; composition in crisis

The Australian Centre for the Moving Image is situated upon the same site that was once occupied by the Princess Bridge railway station. While descending a stairwell that leads into the A.C.M.I. gallery, the memory of train trips that began here pre-1997 are replaced by the anticipation of a metaphorical journey on a raft. Bill Viola's video art-work portrays a studio interior populated by twenty people standing together in a group. African-Americans and Hispanics, Anglo-Saxons and Indians, Asians, Africans, the rich and the poor, but notably, no children. This diverse group of individuals might be waiting for a train to arrive at a platform that no longer exists. Alternatively, Viola may request we consider our tenuous position within a global demographic. A composition in crisis, we, the 6.8 billion people who populate the world, are simultaneously the perpetrators of this crisis, and, its victims. 

The mildly disturbing sound of urban wildlife is heard off-screen. Disgruntled dogs bark at nothing in particular, while startled birds screech in response to the threat of city life as it hums beneath their wings. A woman of Hindi appearance intervenes. Unlike others in the group, there is purpose in her presence as she dissects a path between each by-stander. Prompting a recomposition of the image, she is a forthright yet irritating figure intent upon addressing an Asian woman at centre of the group. The sounds of urban wildlife heard earlier transmute toward a tumult that gathers momentum. The two women greet and subsequently embrace. As they do, others around them raise their arms in feeble gestures of defence. Bodies constrict, and the composition finds new form as it contracts in order to protect itself from that which remains unseen. Violent jets of water perpetrated from left and right engulf this global gathering. A woman of African appearance has a book blown from her hand. She contorts toward the floor while others attempt to resist the tempestuous onslaught. Individuals collide as a business woman is dispossessed of her handbag. While a vagrant collapses at the woman's feet and is prostrate upon the floor. High definition video curtailed to a miniscule speed replaces the painter's brush as the texture of this composition refracts, and coagulates toward multifaceted meaning. Viola's work has been criticised as pretentious. But on-screen, as the deluge of water recedes, it is clear that The Raft succeeds where others believe Viola's previous work may have failed. Battered and bruised, traumatised yet overjoyed, 'the flood' has risen. Humanity may have been reconfigured, but it has prevailed.

In one simple image, this work conceptualises the crisis confronting human beings in the 21st century. Earthquake and tsunami obliterate communities and kill thousands of people. Tension between the U.S. and Asia is manifest as a shift in superpower status toward China and India. Famine relative to global population is an ulcerous entity upon the conscience of first world over-abundance, while organised religion is for many people, bereft of meaning. Lacerated by prejudice, sexual deviancy, and fanaticism, the palpable threat of arbitrary annihilation is an existential possibility. But Viola's concerns are not just sociopolitical, environmental, religious and ontological. The aesthetic mood of The Raft is at once bleak and magnificent, indifferent and uplifting. An unsuspecting group of people is subjected to the catastrophic power of an elemental force. Each writhes and twists in a particular manner. The texture of the group is transformed. Colour and shape are rendered incomprehensible by a sustained saturation of water. This deluge is replaced by a trickle, and then the forecast renewal of affirmative drops of water. Individuals grasp for one another in an effort to reconcile themselves with the aftermath of a catastrophic event. The inherent benevolence of human beings predominates. What prevents each individual from oblivion is an innate concern for another person. Estranged from ourselves, oblivious to each others pain, cynical, selfish and demoralised, Viola suggests that as a species sharing this planet with many other species, we are at our most palatable when we recompose our feelings toward one another, and share this composition in crisis.

The Raft

Performers: Sheryl Arenson, Robin Bonaccorsi, 

Rocky Capella, Cathy Chang, Liisa Cohen,

Tad Coughenour, Tom Ficke, James Ford, 

Michael Irby, Simon Karimian, John Kim,

Tanya Little, Mike Martinez, Petro Martirosian,

Jeff Mosley, Gladys Peters, Maria Victoria, 

Kaye Wade, Kim Weild & Ellis Williams

Executive producer: Kira Perov

Creator & director: Bill Viola

Photography: Kira Perov