Trying to remember takes the form of a performance and installation.
The project started with spinning yarn with a drop spindle, during workshops at London Contemporary Dance School in March 2024 and Art Space G41, Glasgow in August 2024.
It was made during my MA in Expanded Dance Practice at LCDS, with invaluable support from classmates, tutors and the production team. As well as Art Space G41 who generously offered their space to host workshops.
Performances to date:
Studio Wayne MacGregor, as part of FIELDS, November 2024
Credits
Jenny Ward - facilitator, maker, performer
Florence Peake - supervisor
Marie Williamson - filming
Elina Bry - soundscape
Rebecca McShane & Rachel Anne Clarke - weaving
Participants at LCDS and Art Space G41 - hand-spun yarn, conversation, insights
This performance contains:
memories
of shared stims
of mother and daughter, singing
at the top of our lungs
and the bottom of our bellies
of the scent of:
my father's favourite flower,
his mother's favourite flower;
of the flower which accompanied him
back into the earth
of children,
climbing
where we shouldn’t have been climbing
a collective animation
of the vestibular system
making the world our own
I’m using movement and voice to recall:
gestures from ancestors many generations before me
the embodied presence of my grandmother
the fibres of the wool ~ the fibres of my being
the rituals of working-class Irish Catholics in the west of Scotland - Mass, yes
But more-so,
the wee sing-songs in the hoose
eight storeys up
untrained voices singing for each other
with sincerity.
Some songs were funny,
some carried emotion.
the lyrics of others let spill
guts
without a mess
endangered words words that were needed
for a different time
for bodies that spent all day on two feet