Snapshots. The Bell Jar. Dressing Room...

XOXO

Last performances today! Book at Apple Core Festival

Tech. The Bell Jar...

Rocking the 50s style...

XOXO

Photos by Will Bowden and I

The Red Shoes

Finally, here are the production/performance pictures of "The Red Shoes", an installation we've been working on since October. It takes inspiration from the Andersen fairytale of Karen, the girl who danced with the Red Shoes till death and also the 1948 movie who is based on the fairytale and narrates the story of Vicky, a dancer who can't choose between love or dance.

In our version, we had Karen as a ballerina/doll standing on a music box, turning. Throughout the performances, she started deteriorating, to signify her journey and ultimate death in consequence of dancing non stop because of her red pointe shoes. 

I have to say that after all those endless hours we spend sewing on every single bead and pearl, it was hard as hell to break the dress apart, but it created a beautiful aesthetic of decadence and death. Plus, having blood dripping all over me was fun.... (irony?)

Blood packs tryouts in the shower...

 "Time rushes by, love rushes by, life rushes by, but the Red Shoes go on"

         - "Why do you want to dance?"

     + "Why do you want to live?"

                              - "Well I don't know exactly why, but I must"

+ "That is my answer too"

XOXO

The Red Shoes. In Progress ...

You can tell it is production week by many things: double amount of emails from the SM (Stage Managers), lousy/depressed/maniac faces on the corridors, LOUD music, a LOT of swearing (yes, even more than normal). But usually, you know it's production week when set designers/makers come into the costume department to sew their pieces of material together; and I don't mean a couple of meters, more like a couple HUNDRED. 

One minute you are"peacefully" sewing away your pearls, christmas music in the background and the next you are surrounded by a sea of never-ending fabric. Here are some classic set-people-in-costume phrases:

              "This scissors don't seem to be cutting very well..." Reply: (Sigh) They are paper scissors....

              "This sewing machine doesn't like me!"

              "This needle doesn't have a hole?!"  Reply: (sigh x2) It's a pin

              "HELP!"

              "F*** MY LIFE" 

              (General crying)

The pictures are for our upcoming Fairytale projects, ours being The Red Shoes, based around the Andersen classic tale. 

Jumper: Zara

Shorts: Urban Outfitters

Shoes: Zara

Knee High Socks: Uterque

XOXO 

6 Characters in Snapshots...

Finished. Done. Over. Our play 6 Characters in Search of an Author and my second year at university. I can't believe it. It seems surreal, strange. Everything went by so quickly: Easter holidays, production week, all the rehearsals, performances... tomorrow will be the "last" official day in uni, the strike, to clear the space, put costumes back and leave everything as if nothing had happened there. But it did, and I am very proud of the cast and all of us that worked on this performance. We did a great job, were very brave with the idea and pushed it as much as we could. Of course there were technical problems but they weren't within our reach and at the end, what matters most is the performance and it was all there. And it was hauntingly beautiful.

 Here are some photos I took during the Technical Rehearsal. Enjoy!

XOXO