Artist Blog

Every week an artist whose single image was published by Der Greif is given a platform in which to blog about contemporary photography.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CNuQVS7q7-A[/embed] I was working on a music video at the time with Shoreditch Youth Dance company and we were exploring these repetitive synchronised movements. We went to watch Wenders Pina in 3D and I remember being totally absorbed into the theatrical language she uses to explore mundane and everyday gestures. I have since seen three Tanztheater Wuppertal Pina Bausch pieces at Sadler's Wells. The subtle gestures and expressions that are key in Pina's work were lost through by the distance of the cheap seats. However, what is gained is a privileged position looking down on her renowned stage sets, strewn with soil, cacti or grass the times I have seen them. This aerial view allows us to view the rich multilayered vignettes that occur simultaneously. The scenarios relate to what we already know and have experienced. The characters portrayed are familiar but exaggerated under the gaze through Pina's use of repetition and time. She explodes moments of everyday life really scrutinising them to give time and space. It is the tension these moments of endurance create that I am really interested in as well as the often dark humour created by repeating sometimes futile acts. Leaf Peeper and Big Dream, projects I made whilst in Japan at the end of 2011, both explore Japanese culture without trying to present it as a discovery but rather simply exploring how people place themselves and use common public space. I am interested in the subtle gestures of everyday life and therefore draw a lot from Pina's presentation of the world as Norbert Servos (translated by Steph Morris) recounts... "Hers is a world theatre which does not seek to teach, does not claim to know better, instead generating experiences: exhilarating or sorrowful, gentle or confrontational - often comic or absurd too. It creates driven, moving images of inner landscapes, exploring the precise state of human feelings while never giving up hope that the longing for love can one day be met."