{"id":4517,"date":"2021-07-16T20:52:45","date_gmt":"2021-07-16T19:52:45","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/thecritter.co.za\/?p=4517"},"modified":"2021-07-16T20:53:57","modified_gmt":"2021-07-16T19:53:57","slug":"another-kind-extraordinary-archives-and-performance-in-process","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thecritter.co.za\/?p=4517","title":{"rendered":"AnotherKind: Extraordinary archives and performance in process"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Where do waylaid stories go? For the team behind the planned production of the 2020 script for Another Kind of Dying<\/em>, they incubate, become an opportunity for reflection, collaboration, and process \u2013 a building and breaking apart of a script, and an archive of work. What emerges from this methodology is a hybrid live and digital performance, \u201ca funeral for a pie<\/a>c<\/a>e of theatre which never existed<\/a>\u201d, and another kind of theatre-making. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nTheatre\nis changing. Evidenced by the kind of work on show at virtual\nfestivals like the NAF, it\u2019s no longer so\nreliant\non a physical space or a traditional stage, for one. But the way\ntheatre is being developed and disseminated is changing, too. In\nAnother\nKind<\/em>,\nproduced by 2020 Distell Playwright winner Amy Louise-Wilson and her\ndynamic team of collaborators, we are given a piece of theatre that\nis made with contemporary tools, methodologies, and modes of\nengagement, delivered through video, performance, sound, imagery, and\nprocess. \n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The script, an early iteration of which<\/a> was shown and tested at the 2020 vNAF, follows the story of Silumko (played by Aphiwe Livi) from rural Eastern Cape to bustling Johannesburg. It is an enduring story about loss, dreams, breathing and becoming, and it follows a rich South African literary tradition<\/a> \u2013 the tale of a pastoral protagonist who undertakes a journey to the city, changing (and being changed by) the world around him. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Delayed on its way to the stage once again, Another Kind <\/em>is primarily a response to a need for theatre in an ongoing pandemic, yes, but it is also an interactive, digital repository of a performance on the workshop floor, a long view of the act of storytelling. Text, sound, film, inspiration, conversation, collaboration \u2013 all of it is held onto and referred to, neatly and imaginatively housed on a custom webpage-turned-tangible-archive<\/a>. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nCurated\nby Wilson and web-designed by designed\nby Francis Burger, the\nscreen is a palimpsest, a scrollable archive housing all of the\nwritten and reworked parts and disparate fragments that continue to\ninform its greater structure. The secondary thoughts, the peripheral\nand experimental ideas that were pushed aside, but which continue to\ninform from the margins, are all still held and put to use. Here,\nwords perform, images dance, video works alongside the printed word\nand music guides the silent act of reading. It is, to borrow from the\nwriter Ivan Vladislavic, an \u2018exploded view\u2019 of a performance in\nprogress, broken open to illustrate and investigate the many moving\nparts that make it whole. \n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nActivating\nthis extraordinary archive are a series of live-streamed desktop\nperformances by Wilson who, from within the neat borders of a notepad\napp, guides audiences through the interactive page, and along the\njourney of producing the work. It begins on Woodstock\u2019s Albert\nRoad, where a video shows the team of collaborators making use of\neveryday materials \u2013 poles, paper, plastics packets \u2013 to develop\na burgeoning chorus, a swelling soundscape. Soundbites add further\ncontext, while fragments of the scene \u2013 images of the team in\naction and key items from the story \u2013 invite you to engage with\nthem, dragging them across the screen to play with and produce\ncollaborative collages of your own. All the while, Wilson\u2019s words\nwork away like a ghost in the machine, talking you through the\ncontents. \n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

From here, we follow the journey of Silumko in tandem with the journey of the play itself, moving through the tall, yellow grass of Alice on the border of the Eastern Cape to the bristling soundscape of Johannesburg\u2019s Park Station. Collages by Duduetsang Lamola aka blk banaana set the scene, and costume and dreamy film courtesy of Francois Knoetze further immerse us in the unfolding script. As we read the stage directions<\/a> detailing Silumko springing into action and racing after a bakkie rattling down a dirt road (an image which Wilson reveals appeared to her in a series of dreams), Bongeziwe Mabandla\u2019s \u2018Ndokulandela\u2019 plays out from the left of the screen, lending a rhythm and texture to the scene. We journey to Silumko\u2019s aunt\u2019s house in Alex, from the cosmopolitan reaches of Mall of Africa to the ceaseless labour of construction sites and the arresting vignettes that comprise Silumko\u2019s dreamscape. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nWe\ndo not move in a linear fashion. Time, the ever-present chorus\nreminds us, is circular. We dip in and out of it, shifting experience\nand perspective all the while. In a particularly striking scene where\nSilumko learns of the circumstances of his father\u2019s death, Wilson\u2019s\nwords appear in the word-processor again: \u201cThis scene is, for me,\nthe most painful moment to watch\u2026 I\u2019m going to close my eyes now.\nBut you watch.\u201d \n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nIt\nis a mournful, clawing scene full of breath and yearning, airless and\noverwhelming. We wade further into abstraction, deeper into the\ndreamscape where Silumko asks his friend: \u201cHow did you become\nbrave?\u201d (an essential question about freedom, we are told). The\nscene comes to a close, and Wilson\u2019s words return, guiding us out\nof it: \u201cTake a deep breath now. I\u2019m taking one, too. Roll your\nshoulders back and down. I\u2019m going to move us into a place of joy\nnow. High up on a rooftop in Hillbrow. Here is a Silumko we haven\u2019t\nseen before.\u201d \n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nA\nrecurring motif guides us now, the crackling radio, alive with music.\nIt is the radio that Silumko listened to as a boy, surrounded by his\ncattle and in the shade of a tree. In the Eastern Cape, powered by\nbatteries his father would bring back from Johannesburg, it would\nplay his mother\u2019s favourite song, Leta Mbulu\u2019s \u2018There\u2019s Music\nin the Air\u2019. Now, on an inner-city rooftop where fabric flutters in\nthe breeze (a beautiful realisation of a dream-sequence we see\nearlier) it churns out the radio hits of the day and Silumko, the\nprotagonist so weighed down by memory, the burden of history, and the\nagony of choice, dreams, and identity, begins to dance. \n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nCertainly,\ntheatre is changing. In Another\nKind<\/em>,\nwe are given an idea of where that change can take us, and how the\narchive, the rich repository of storytelling, methodology,\ncollaboration and more, does not have to remain static. Rather, it\ncan serve as part of the process itself \u2013 a relentless pursuit of\nperformance that is always in a state of change, and open to new\nideas. A process that is generous, generative, and democratic. \n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There is so much more to say about a body of work such as this, and the many people that helped build it. But time, although circular, is of the essence and Wilson still has two more desktop performances<\/a> to share with us. Go and watch them. They are extraordinary. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\n\u00a92021 The Critter. This article is licensed under a <\/em>Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nCREDITS:<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nDirector:\nAmy Louise Wilson
\nCurator: Amy Louise Wilson
\nLive-stream\ndesktop performance by: Amy Louise Wilson
\nPerformance by: Aphiwe\nLivi
\nFilmed by: Francois Knoetze
\nSet Designer: Francois\nKnoetze
\nCostume Designer: Francois Knoetze <\/em>\n<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Where do waylaid stories go? For the team behind the planned production of the 2020 script for Another Kind of Dying, they incubate, become an opportunity for reflection, collaboration, and … Read More<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":18,"featured_media":4518,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mi_skip_tracking":false},"categories":[11],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thecritter.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4517"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thecritter.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thecritter.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thecritter.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/18"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thecritter.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4517"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/thecritter.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4517\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4520,"href":"https:\/\/thecritter.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4517\/revisions\/4520"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thecritter.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/4518"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thecritter.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4517"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thecritter.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4517"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thecritter.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4517"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}