Blocks and beats

Here's the platform blocks as they are being pushed about and un-configured in Echo Echo's dance studio.

The dancers and director are working out different stages as they move it about towards the finished configuration. 

The music by Christopher Norby is excellent - very distinct and disparate phases from romantic strings, to drum and bass like ambience - to something like (but better) ozric tentacles to funky bass. Hard, off-beat, jerky, soft and mellow. Nice work.

It will offer a great tension and complement with the hardness of the platform - although the platform is now mellowing with beautiful scratches and scuffs - becoming more alive. Will also be interesting when the lighting is developed.

dan

Images of the COVE platform going together in my studio:

Production update:

Feel like a car factory bodywork fitter...

About halfway through fitting the dibond surface on the outer sides. Looks great - already the tracing of markings, scratches and smears is beautiful. The colours will need a touch up as trimming the dibond edges to fit scrapes up the paintwork.

Three days til deadline...dan

Slowly slowly getting there with the platform blocks.

Heavy work - lots of surface to paint, paint and re-paint. They are quite heavy but not so difficult to move. I've been doing it alone using a set of wheels - pretty easy. The paint work will get knocked about - but we have to just go with that and touch up when necessary.

Think it's looking beautiful tho.

Bit of a worry about if it'll fit into the man's van...

Dibond to fit next.

dan

THE COVE - developments

Thanks to the help of Marty the platform set for The Cove is well under production:

After some battles with the world of geometry and the curvature of the earth we are closing in on the final structure. It's an endlessly configurable structure which has one specified configuration of a sloping plane based on the original we made in the Port a Doris cove last Sep.

I conceive of the structure - and the movement and configuring of the structure - being a very live element in the choreography - and one that offers an unpredictable (probably starting) ground for each performance.
dan

The Short Story so far…

Echo Echo Dance Theatre Company is known for thinking outside of the box when it comes to approaching contemporary dance performance, and the newest production sees the company merge visual arts, music and dance with outdoor pursuits to create a truly original show. 

It all started with an email “Hi Dan, I want you to teach me to climb…” 

Echo Echo had just been awarded £125,000 from Legacy Trust UK for a three-year dance and sport project. Steve Batts, Artistic Director, was interested in researching the similarities and differences between climbing as a sport and the movement of climbing. Dan Shipsides is an acclaimed artist, based in Belfast, with a passion for climbing so it seemed like a perfect collaboration. 

Over the space of about 18 months the two went climbing many times. Their research led them towards an interest in not just climbing and movement but the experience of climbing and how the environment and landscape contributed to the experience. 

Steve and Dan set up a blog to document their thoughts and research, the project titled Vertical. Nature. Base. It culminated in a two week on site expedition to a hidden cove near Shroove, County Donegal. The public were invited to find the camp and join it at weekends to participate in the research and climbing. 

The place, Port-a-Doris, proved to be a magical, inspiring place- looking out towards Downhill beach on the other side of Lough Foyle. The group even made friends with the local seals, naming one Bob. 

Many local residents came to visit and told stories of the cove having been a place where people proposed to their sweethearts and carved their names. They came to dance there too, many years ago, in secret. Interesting that Echo Echo had returned in 2011 to dance too. 

After two weeks, Steve and Dan returned to Derry to collate the research, using materials collected (careful not to disturb the environment at the cove) into a visual arts exhibition with short dance performances. This opened to the public for ten days. 

Now, this background, experience and research informs ‘The Cove’ a dance theatre production, directed by Steve Batts, which will tour across the North of Ireland in October 2012. 

Using a unique creative process, which Steve named “embodying landscape”, Echo Echo have created a full-length movement performance, for six female dancers, with a dynamic stage design by Dan. 

An original score has been created by talented emerging composer Christopher Norby (who has composed for Ulster Orchestra and NI Opera). 

Everyone involved in the production has visited the cove at Port-a-Doris and each individual’s personal memories and experiences from that place will be tied together to form an hour-long performance. 

The audience will be seated in the round, with no one seat giving the same viewing experience- much like a visit to the cove itself. 

“The Cove pulses with the memories of scaling the crags with the sea below, feeling the rocks with fingertips, smelling and tasting the air, with the effort, the challenge, the pleasure, the fear, the sense of mortality and the peacefulness and release.”

The tour premieres on Wednesday 3rd October 2012 in An Grianan Theatre, Letterkenny and finishes in Echo Echo’s hometown Derry-Londonderry at The Millennium Forum on Wednesday 17th October. It will tour to Limavady, Omagh, Downpatrick, Cookstown and Belfast. 

Watch the wonderful 30 minute documentary about Vertical. Nature. Base. here. For more information on Echo Echo, visit www.echoechodance.com

Vertical. Nature. Base Documentary Film