My art practice includes live performance, textual performance, work developed in response to context or occasion, and participation in group or collaborative projects. Performance ranges from live reading, to singing, to durational work involving making and being in a space. Texts may prompt a performance response, a site or occasion can guide the activity, or an incident will give rise to an action or task that becomes the base for writing. Other aspects of the practice involve generating and editing text and image, via verbal or digital material occurring in the site or environment, or in response to encounters with scripts, audience or data.
Elements of humour, repetition, references to high and low culture, allow audiences to make connections, construct narratives, or recognise patterns. In my performance ‘Cream of the Crop’ (2024), I looked at the legacy of dairy farming and its environmental and social impact using a frame of grass and field sports. In my collaboration with Shelley Hodgson (2024-25) we have played with models of language learning and teaching to explore how identity is often determined by language and how systems of communication can sometimes glitch leading to confusion or damage. ‘Revised Dictionary Supplement’ (2022) is a solo performance using improvised actions, dance, sound, recorded text and gestures, that in part examines the aggression, threat and anonymity of social media. ‘Telling Time’ (2018-2020) is a speech-choir workshop that examines our diverse relationships to time, our use of language, and facilitates collaborative text making.
Selected Projects and Performances
‘twiceness’ to ‘thriceness’ (2024-25) – a collaborative making project developed with artist Shelley Hodgson
‘cream of the crop’ (2024) – improvised live solo performance with text and props
‘revised dictionary supplement’ (2022) – solo performance with audio and improvised movement
‘material + transition’ (2018) – performance developed in collaboration with Rosanna Irvine
‘telling time’ (2018) – a Communal Making workshop for Jamboree
‘threaded insert’ (2017) – site-responsive performance with text
‘Subject to Gesture’ (2017) – collaborative performance project with musician Benjamin D. Duvall
‘his voice’ (2015 – 16) – live performance with digital interface and projection
‘Surface / Contact’ (2015) – work for group exhibition at Exeter Phoenix
‘answering machine’ (2014) – live and online performance commissioned for Experimentica14
‘muster page habit 2’ (2013) – live vocal performance with digital interface
‘flat-head self-tapping’ (2012 – 15) – performance with audio feed and actions
‘Hand in Glove’ (2004 – 12) – performance with text and live video feed
‘Voice Recognition: A Play’ (2011 – 12) – performance with spoken text and song
‘figure and ground: Plymouth’ (2010) – 2-day performance with embroidery and audience interaction
‘barbed gadlyngs’ (2008) – day-long performance making neckties and developing text
‘figure and ground: Alytus’ (2007) – 2-day performance modifying 4 shirts and developing an intervention