Her Name is Carol ~ a residency / Australia / 2008
Her Name is Carole was a residency in Australia.
A residency that took me search of a sister I have no memory of ever meeting
Arriving into Perth in the west.
i traveled east . . . .
across the continent in a white Ute, across the outback,
"where white folk just don't live, where there is nothing, where you might die and where it is boring".
Or so I was told.
I went in search across a landscape that is not of my own.
I went in search of a woman who I did not know but I was related to through a miscalculation of birth.
We shared the same father and that was our only tenuous link.
There is also a brother.
I had learnt about Carole's location back in 1989 when I had last seen my brother.
As 3 people we had never really been a family - I had never consciously met Carole but knew of her existence.
My brother had been around in shifts in my early years, but nothing of any significance.
Our father died in the late 70's.
Suicide.
My brother got involved in the situation but never arrived for the funeral.
He jumped ship and I was left to deal with death in the hard light of day,
Although he did take me to the morgue so we could both stare at someone we may of been related to.
It is also tenuous, related to, family, brother, sister in name through a father who seemed lost in his own anger.
The background to this residency has a relevance to the project and to the landscape.
Who and what are we connected to?
Apart from a sister being in Australia, I have as a British Born Male have a relationship to this vast distant colony.
If you dig a hole in the garden you'll get to Australia . . . so I was told.
Our history with his land is tarnished with hate, brutality, cruelty, ignorance, violence, abuse and a heightened sense of imperialism that is still in location in so many forms.
The distant cousins.
In 1986 I was planning to jump ship myself and head out to the gold coast where I had a friend.
Other things happened and I never made it.
In 2004 I was taken by Nikki Millican of New Moves International to perform in Brisbane and Perth.
I headed to Sydney first in order to see and touch the Opera House. I figment of memory as I had seen it being built on Blue Peter, and if I was going so far, I had to do more than simply arrive and perform, where you see very little apart form the venue, a bar, a hotel room and a road in between.
I went in search for Carole, as an idea, a possibility of meeting, experiencing people and place.
On arrival I realised I could be related to so many people there.
The streets, the buildings, the bars, the walks where of home.
I kept heading forwards with an idea and over the years of arriving and leaving, the sense that Australia was a working class bolt hole struck me with a force of nature and realisation that the working class had built this outpost of England.
Carole had been a £25,00 pom.
There had been £10.00 poms before that. A deal that made it simple to populate an island.
It was an invasion plan that had been going on for years.
The offer of moving people out to Australia and set up home.
If you were living in Gorton or the east end of Manchester, the life changing opportunity was a golden ticket, and many people took it.
I have sat in many a bar in Australia and felt the atmosphere of Salford and that of manchester, the atmosphere of white working class sensibility,
a home from home, part of something, connected through disconnection of class and origin.
The complexity of my nation
The working class sensibility, the best and the worst.
In 2007 I hooked up once again with Zain Trow.
Zain was originally the Artistic Director of The Power House in Brisbane where I had performed in 2004.
I had received a travel grant off Arts Admin and I was planning another search for Carol.
We planned and schemed and I arrived back in Brisbane for a 4 day whirl wing, delivering a performance, setting up dialogues and meeting head of Queensland Arts.
The funding could possibly be in place to get me back into the country.
I bought the cheapest ticket I could which took me to Perth.
I bought a truck and did my how to survive in the outback with technician Andy Beck.
I loaded the van with my supplies and took off, road map in hand.
A residency that took me search of a sister I have no memory of ever meeting
Arriving into Perth in the west.
i traveled east . . . .
across the continent in a white Ute, across the outback,
"where white folk just don't live, where there is nothing, where you might die and where it is boring".
Or so I was told.
I went in search across a landscape that is not of my own.
I went in search of a woman who I did not know but I was related to through a miscalculation of birth.
We shared the same father and that was our only tenuous link.
There is also a brother.
I had learnt about Carole's location back in 1989 when I had last seen my brother.
As 3 people we had never really been a family - I had never consciously met Carole but knew of her existence.
My brother had been around in shifts in my early years, but nothing of any significance.
Our father died in the late 70's.
Suicide.
My brother got involved in the situation but never arrived for the funeral.
He jumped ship and I was left to deal with death in the hard light of day,
Although he did take me to the morgue so we could both stare at someone we may of been related to.
It is also tenuous, related to, family, brother, sister in name through a father who seemed lost in his own anger.
The background to this residency has a relevance to the project and to the landscape.
Who and what are we connected to?
Apart from a sister being in Australia, I have as a British Born Male have a relationship to this vast distant colony.
If you dig a hole in the garden you'll get to Australia . . . so I was told.
Our history with his land is tarnished with hate, brutality, cruelty, ignorance, violence, abuse and a heightened sense of imperialism that is still in location in so many forms.
The distant cousins.
In 1986 I was planning to jump ship myself and head out to the gold coast where I had a friend.
Other things happened and I never made it.
In 2004 I was taken by Nikki Millican of New Moves International to perform in Brisbane and Perth.
I headed to Sydney first in order to see and touch the Opera House. I figment of memory as I had seen it being built on Blue Peter, and if I was going so far, I had to do more than simply arrive and perform, where you see very little apart form the venue, a bar, a hotel room and a road in between.
I went in search for Carole, as an idea, a possibility of meeting, experiencing people and place.
On arrival I realised I could be related to so many people there.
The streets, the buildings, the bars, the walks where of home.
I kept heading forwards with an idea and over the years of arriving and leaving, the sense that Australia was a working class bolt hole struck me with a force of nature and realisation that the working class had built this outpost of England.
Carole had been a £25,00 pom.
There had been £10.00 poms before that. A deal that made it simple to populate an island.
It was an invasion plan that had been going on for years.
The offer of moving people out to Australia and set up home.
If you were living in Gorton or the east end of Manchester, the life changing opportunity was a golden ticket, and many people took it.
I have sat in many a bar in Australia and felt the atmosphere of Salford and that of manchester, the atmosphere of white working class sensibility,
a home from home, part of something, connected through disconnection of class and origin.
The complexity of my nation
The working class sensibility, the best and the worst.
In 2007 I hooked up once again with Zain Trow.
Zain was originally the Artistic Director of The Power House in Brisbane where I had performed in 2004.
I had received a travel grant off Arts Admin and I was planning another search for Carol.
We planned and schemed and I arrived back in Brisbane for a 4 day whirl wing, delivering a performance, setting up dialogues and meeting head of Queensland Arts.
The funding could possibly be in place to get me back into the country.
I bought the cheapest ticket I could which took me to Perth.
I bought a truck and did my how to survive in the outback with technician Andy Beck.
I loaded the van with my supplies and took off, road map in hand.
I took off over land - Destination Brisbane > Via > Cains where I was to catch up with an old pal of mine from the 80's.
The route to be travelled was Perth > Kalgoorlie > Norseman > Nullarbor Plain > Caduna > Port Augusta > Coober Pedy > left > Uluru > back track > left > Alice Springs > Tennant Creek > Right > Barkly Tableland >Mount Isa > on > Townsville >
Detour to Cains for a night of drinking, laughing and pissing in the wrong places.
Turn round and back to Townsville and head down the coast to Brisbane.
That's approximately 7000kn.
The route to be travelled was Perth > Kalgoorlie > Norseman > Nullarbor Plain > Caduna > Port Augusta > Coober Pedy > left > Uluru > back track > left > Alice Springs > Tennant Creek > Right > Barkly Tableland >Mount Isa > on > Townsville >
Detour to Cains for a night of drinking, laughing and pissing in the wrong places.
Turn round and back to Townsville and head down the coast to Brisbane.
That's approximately 7000kn.
It's a long way, west to east . . . always heading towards the rising sun.
Sustaining life, keeping alive.
On arrival into Perth I was consistently informed that the route I was about to undertake was,
"Boring", that there was "Nothing There" and that i was going to "Die".
Perth was pretty boring, there wasn't a lot there and any given Friday or Saturday night I could die.
Perth is the most remote city in the world.
It is the closest to the vast mining industries that are dotted throughout Western Australia.
Friday and Saturday is going out and the city becomes a hub for wealthy miners to arrive and drink, fuck, sing and fight.
Sustaining Life:
The route was pretty straight forwarded, but the distance was beyond my physical comprehension.
Perth to Kalgoorlie is 372.7 miles.
John O'groats to Lands End is 603 miles.
That was my first day and I realised that I had to slow down.
The vastness was overwhelming - In one day I had driven a distance longer than England and it was a blip on map.
On any given journey I establish structures > activities > gathering & collecting systems.
Within the vastness of this landscape these structures were needed or I would get lost.
Physically as I could start wondering off track / searching / finding /
Mentally one could loose any bearings of location > one is spending hours / days / weeks in a rare form of isolation.
The expanse of land locates the self into a remote body and structures / systems / engagements needed to be precise and specific to place and time.
Sustaining life, keeping alive.
On arrival into Perth I was consistently informed that the route I was about to undertake was,
"Boring", that there was "Nothing There" and that i was going to "Die".
Perth was pretty boring, there wasn't a lot there and any given Friday or Saturday night I could die.
Perth is the most remote city in the world.
It is the closest to the vast mining industries that are dotted throughout Western Australia.
Friday and Saturday is going out and the city becomes a hub for wealthy miners to arrive and drink, fuck, sing and fight.
Sustaining Life:
The route was pretty straight forwarded, but the distance was beyond my physical comprehension.
Perth to Kalgoorlie is 372.7 miles.
John O'groats to Lands End is 603 miles.
That was my first day and I realised that I had to slow down.
The vastness was overwhelming - In one day I had driven a distance longer than England and it was a blip on map.
On any given journey I establish structures > activities > gathering & collecting systems.
Within the vastness of this landscape these structures were needed or I would get lost.
Physically as I could start wondering off track / searching / finding /
Mentally one could loose any bearings of location > one is spending hours / days / weeks in a rare form of isolation.
The expanse of land locates the self into a remote body and structures / systems / engagements needed to be precise and specific to place and time.
But what was I searching for.
Two weeks prior to arrival I had received an email from my brother who I had not seen or heard
from since the late '80's.
If you wanted to find Carol why didn't you ask me?
It was a short and bitter sweet message and something I needed to engage with on my arrival into Australia.
I was in the throws of a large scale commission for London Contemporary Arts Society and Beck's Beer - for their up and coming Fusion Festival and I was making 7 large scale suspended chromosomes.
On arrival I sent an email in reply.
I am here and I can meet Carole.
I'm still waiting for the reply.
It's not a tragedy it is family history that we often inherit and I was on the road with nowhere to go but someone to search. I had taken myself off across one of the most arid, isolated locations on the planet, there are more animals that can kill you than anywhere else in the world.
Two weeks prior to arrival I had received an email from my brother who I had not seen or heard
from since the late '80's.
If you wanted to find Carol why didn't you ask me?
It was a short and bitter sweet message and something I needed to engage with on my arrival into Australia.
I was in the throws of a large scale commission for London Contemporary Arts Society and Beck's Beer - for their up and coming Fusion Festival and I was making 7 large scale suspended chromosomes.
On arrival I sent an email in reply.
I am here and I can meet Carole.
I'm still waiting for the reply.
It's not a tragedy it is family history that we often inherit and I was on the road with nowhere to go but someone to search. I had taken myself off across one of the most arid, isolated locations on the planet, there are more animals that can kill you than anywhere else in the world.
It's not friendly and as locations go it seemed to have a worse reputation than most places for extinguishing life, either through boredom or being bitten by a spider, any, snake or crashing your car and being stuck somewhere and dying of thirst.
What was I searching for?
What was I searching for in a location where white folks just don't go?
I needed structures that would enable me to sustain me as well as generating material for 2 85 minute performances, four days upon my arrival into Brisbane.
What was I searching for?
What was I searching for in a location where white folks just don't go?
I needed structures that would enable me to sustain me as well as generating material for 2 85 minute performances, four days upon my arrival into Brisbane.
What was I searching for?
Why was I here?
Where was I to go?
Where was Carol?
When presented with a vastness of space and a search through the nothing of time
then there will always be something.
I set up a sequence of structures.
Record the sky everyday.
Record the sounds that most attract you.
Record the road journey through the wind screen.
Record the walks taken that were inspired by by looking for Carol.
When your presented with distance that has an infinity of curvature set within its line,
Presented with paths trailing off over distances unimaginable . . . that was where I was to find Carole.
I would take myself off over tracks and walk.
Where I arrived would be what I would find.
The search had become a metaphorical excursion across a poetic landscape.
I collected containers of dirt, objects that had been left in the sand.
I wrote down every question that arrived to me.
Every question related and reflected to someone, somewhere of my life.
This became my frame work of existence and living.
It became a series of questions focusing on identity, belonging, ownership, location.
I was searching for a sister in the desert and actually opened up a far larger vessel of investigation than I could of imagined.
Record the sounds that most attract you.
Record the road journey through the wind screen.
Record the walks taken that were inspired by by looking for Carol.
When your presented with distance that has an infinity of curvature set within its line,
Presented with paths trailing off over distances unimaginable . . . that was where I was to find Carole.
I would take myself off over tracks and walk.
Where I arrived would be what I would find.
The search had become a metaphorical excursion across a poetic landscape.
I collected containers of dirt, objects that had been left in the sand.
I wrote down every question that arrived to me.
Every question related and reflected to someone, somewhere of my life.
This became my frame work of existence and living.
It became a series of questions focusing on identity, belonging, ownership, location.
I was searching for a sister in the desert and actually opened up a far larger vessel of investigation than I could of imagined.
One is presented with the most sublime moments - a theatre from the 1950's, it is not preserved it is what it is.
A large scale image of a heart, a natural form weathered from rain.
Manchester on a shop banner and your Manchester's are your towels, sheets, pillow cases . . . because that is where the cotton products came from.
One is searching within a series of structures that enabled me to find my feet in a landscape white folks just don't cross.
A large scale image of a heart, a natural form weathered from rain.
Manchester on a shop banner and your Manchester's are your towels, sheets, pillow cases . . . because that is where the cotton products came from.
One is searching within a series of structures that enabled me to find my feet in a landscape white folks just don't cross.
OutBack
Out Back - It's a strange term for one of the biggest emptiest locations in the world.
Out Back - is what you would say to someone if you were from the north of England
"They're outback" pointing to one of the smallest space connected to your house -
the outback is often your back yard - a small space that would of housed the toilet.
I kind of like this reference to the outback being connected to your back yard in a northern town in England.
Exposes a relationship with country, location, size, land mass, ownership through naming.
Anything not in the inhabited wastelands of cities that have been developed on the coastal edges is outback.
Dark Dangerous and uninhabitable.
Out Back - is what you would say to someone if you were from the north of England
"They're outback" pointing to one of the smallest space connected to your house -
the outback is often your back yard - a small space that would of housed the toilet.
I kind of like this reference to the outback being connected to your back yard in a northern town in England.
Exposes a relationship with country, location, size, land mass, ownership through naming.
Anything not in the inhabited wastelands of cities that have been developed on the coastal edges is outback.
Dark Dangerous and uninhabitable.
LINKS to Video
White Lines
http://vimeo.com/26853754
Searching for Carol
http://vimeo.com/34962773
Real Time Review
http://www.realtimearts.net/article/88/9247
White Lines
http://vimeo.com/26853754
Searching for Carol
http://vimeo.com/34962773
Real Time Review
http://www.realtimearts.net/article/88/9247
The Performance following a durational Process
Having seen images from the performance performed in Brisbane @
Exist '08 - Now look at the process to this journey & so the performance ~
Process:
Links to Questions from the deserts
Exist '08 - Now look at the process to this journey & so the performance ~
Process:
Links to Questions from the deserts