Michael Mayhew
​ 
 'One of the most original and searching artists currently working in the UK.’
​
​ John McGrath – Artistic Director, Manchester International Festival
  • Begin Here >
    • City Arcadia - Contents
    • City Arcadia - Dossier #1 >
      • Welcome to the Future >
        • River - Kate Hawkins >
          • Dossier #2 - River >
            • David Rudlin - Looking & Seeing >
              • Coventry as it was once imagined >
                • Dossier #3 Looking & Seeing >
                  • The Coventry Peace Table >
                    • HUNGER >
                      • Future Propositions for a city
    • 11 11 11 ~ In Remembrance ~ Manchester >
      • Kris Canavan
      • Alistair MacLennan
      • Bean
      • Nicola Canavan
      • Martin O’Brien
      • Leo Devlin
      • Lisa Newman
      • Nina Whiteman
      • Mark Greenwood
      • Victoria Grey
      • Sally O'Dowd
    • 12 12 12 - Humanity Manchester
    • Allery Gallery 2012 >
      • Images from The Allery Gallery
    • The Body as Art >
      • Process & Practice >
        • Thinking Clay / Feeling Bodies
      • Participants >
        • Lydia Darling >
          • 'I cannot make this work without you'
        • Ria Hartley >
          • Reflection on . . .
        • Sarah Faulkner
      • The Body as art / DIY9 >
        • Mayhew & Huda
    • Curious Links
  • Journey Here >
    • Past is always present >
      • Residencies / Commissions >
        • Dreams Disturbs Reality
        • Devine Ecstasy of Destruction
        • Dogs of Heaven
        • My House is Your House Your House is Mine >
          • For Get Me (k) Not
        • Always Forgetting What is Beneath Me
        • 3:3:3 >
          • patterns of research / process/ practice >
            • 10 Year Development / there is no title
        • The Grand Tour / See Beyond >
          • See Beyond
        • Let China Make Me
        • The Gathering
        • rituals of being not being >
          • Gallery / Rituals of being not being.
        • Her Name Is Carol >
          • A Process in Searching . . . >
            • Questions from the deserts
        • Contemporary Arts Society Commission >
          • The Vent Collection
          • YX Collection
        • Surgery of Dreams
        • Cabinets of Curiosity
        • S.A.R.C Liminal Lands
      • The Doctors Notes
      • Away in a Manger
      • Hope Land - A Landscape Installation >
        • List of Works >
          • Gallery of Hope Land
      • Michael & Michael >
        • Black Chav / White Coon >
          • Performance Images >
            • Remain Moist /
    • Active Remains of Performance Art
    • Mechanical Air / Stage One >
      • Stage Two >
        • Stage Three >
          • Stage Four >
            • Space Life >
              • Life of Mechanical Air / A WebLog
    • Compositions & The Hyper~Graphic Score >
      • Hyper - Graphic Scores
    • Walking Films
    • Cavan / Inter / art
    • Writing >
      • Text / This Ain't No Abigail's Fucking Party
      • Text - Away in a manger
      • Talk - Change is as good as a rest
      • Text by Mark Greenwood / Blind Mans Blood /
      • Blood for Money: By Lisa Newman
      • Review / Black British Rebels:
      • J O Y
    • p r o l i f e r a t i o n
    • Somethings about Mayhew
  • End Here >
  • contact


                                                   Dreams Disturb Reality / The Wasteland Trilogy:

                                                                                         Manchester Festival Commission 1988

Nominated for a Manchester Evening News Award
Picture
Set within 3 locations / 

                                                The Britannia Hotel

                                                                                                  Mnishull Street

                                                                                                                                                     The Rochedale Canal

What lies beneath our feet? What do the sites of Waste Lands offer us? In times of political strangulation what dreams can be offered that disturb reality? what beauty, what horror can we manifest that will enable for a liberation of the spirit, an expression of freedom, a sign of hope and a revelation for humanity?
This was a long time ago but with the Tories back in power who are playing out a nostalgic theatrical game of divide and rule
I experience the eighties once again. With the cuts / the splits between rich and poor, the divide within a nation, the ransacking of public services, 
the brutal engagement with a population it is all slightly more destructive.
I began this site specific performance in a flash swank kitsch hotel in the centre of Manchester.
The Britannia Hotel was built as a ware house and re-developed into a hotel.
There was something totally 80's about it - Over the top extravagant wealth . . .  it was and still is slightly crass in it's veneer, it was a front to a wasteland of lost dreams and hope. It was a location that summed up the period, offering anyone the opportunity to live for a night with tat.

Non of it was real, it was all Porches and big ties, flash suits and crushed carpets.

We met our audience in this front to Thatcherism and offered them a 'Better Place'.

Moving the audience through the streets, Minshull Street, the gay village, past the law courts and into the subterranean landscape of the Rochdale Canal.

The fluid veins of the city, the cruising areas for men to meet man on man, the location for men to grapple with bought sex with prostitutes up against the wall.
Leading an audience down beneath the streets into the psyche of the city, where Opera singers floated on water, trapeze artists suspended beneath the ground, drummers hacked out beats, dancers were raised from the deaths of the water, explosions of song and the assassination of song, this was a dangerous world, unruly, anarchic, unseen from the world above.

The Dreams that Disturb Reality was raw beauty of hope.
Photos by Charlie Baker
Powered by Create your own unique website with customizable templates.