A guide to being alive
On this page, you will be able to find an online articulation of the project that Benjamin Knowles and I are exploring for our major project.
The aim of the performance is to offer comfort in knowing that the uncertainty of life is not the be-all and end-all. The performance is a reflection of the many aspects that make up life from many different viewpoints.
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Do you ever wonder what it means to be alive? You are born, you laugh, you cry, you live, you die and it repeats again.
Have you ever noticed the same patterns reappearing, over and over again? You make something, you laugh, you destroy, you cry, you leave.
Do you wonder whether you have actually stepped in the same river twice? Maybe you haven’t, but how would you know if you had.
Does everyone fit the same narrative? Through anchor points and frame threads let us explore these questions.
Let us remind you what it means to be alive.
contents
Bridging the gap
In the beginning
Deconstruction
Tentacular thinking
Theatre and memory
From start to finish
The making
AI art
The interveiws
Feedback chats
References
Bridging the gap
Due to the physical distance that Ben and I are experiencing we have had to find creative ways to make work to progress the piece. One of the ways that we chose to do this was to send performative responses to each other using the last response as the next stimulus. This has proven extremely beneficial to not only finding the focus of the final performance but also to explore areas of the topic that are deeper than the surface. The ever-evolving responses naturally show life as a concept and all the little aspects that come with it. Below you can see a trail of our responses.
These performative responses will be used in the 'make something' section as it expresses the journey that life is where you are shaped by what comes before but always evolving.
While the original responses didn't make the final cut, we used elements from all of the responses and partnered it with a soundscape made based on the song and sounds linked to the other images/ videos.
Linked below is the soundscape that also didn't make the cut, however, it evolved and bled into other areas of the performance.
In the beginning
Ben and I have similar practices in the sense that we don't have a specific practice, we continue to evolve with the more we learn. This is what led us to begin where we did. We both love knowledge and learning, and we both liked the idea of creating a performance based on fact and theory yet spinning autobiographical elements into it. We both admired Haraway's concept of Tentacular thinking and knew this was the concept we would find most useful.
Stringing it together
We began with string theory due to the amount of string we had accumulated from previous projects. This quickly led us down the route of creating a web and what instructions a spider follows in order to create a perfect web. The instructions are as follows:
First a Strong Bridge Line is laid across the top.
Several Anchor Points are then added to each side.
Frame Threads are then Laid Down.
Radii are then fixed to the central hub.
Check every angle to ensure there are enough Spokes.
An auxiliary spiral is laid down from the centre outwards.
Sticky elastic silk is used to form the capture spiral.
The centre hub is then eaten and replaced with a few new strands.
The radii are then pulled taut.
Using the idea of strict instruction, like the spider, we decided that we wanted to use this to structure the piece.
We developed our own instructions for sections:
Take my hand
Make something
Destroy something
Time you Laughed
Time you cried
Leave
We liked the idea of sticking with instructions as this reflected life and nature which we wanted to highlight in the piece. Yet we wanted to link it to the human experience, expressing the highs and lows of life and how they are all equal and one not better or worse than another. Life and death are not opposites, just two components of life.
The idea that a ripple on one string will affect every other interconnecting string. This can be seen in many aspects of life. Theories such as the butterfly effect support this idea. ' Lorenz suggested that the flap of a butterfly’s wings might ultimately cause a tornado.' ( Dizikes, 2011: online) We wanted to unpick these behaviours and how life has patterns that can be seen repeating itself. This gave us our base question ‘what does it mean to be alive?’ Is it to have these behaviours? Is it to be capable of feeling emotion? Through our research, it seems everyone has a different opinion on this.
Eventually, the strict instruction morphed into slightly more contemporary concepts than stated above.
An example of this is:
'Take my hand' reflected a child being guided by an older figure.
'Make something' became an evolution of ever-changing and growing.
'Time you laughed' became a time where you felt most alive and reflecting liveness.
'Destroy something' became the dismantling of memories when they become distorted over time.
'Time you cried' became an experience to experiment with what your body goes through when in a low point
'Leave became a reflection of death showing life as a cyclical process rather than having an endpoint.
These base points were in essence our 'frame threads' and while the content and delivery of the sections changed, we held these threads strong, so we had a point of grounding in the devising. This was essential when our main way of devising was Tentacular thinking.
Deconstruction
Derrida
In Turner's article, 'Jacques Derrida: Deconstruction', she breaks the concept down into manageable sections. She says,
'Three key features emerge from Derrida’s work as making deconstruction possible. These are, first, the inherent desire to have a centre, or focal point, to structure understanding (logocentrism); second, the reduction of meaning to set definitions that are committed to writing (nothing beyond the text); and, finally, how the reduction of meaning to writing captures opposition within that concept itself (différance).' (Turner, 2016: online)
Using this way of breaking deconstruction down we began to remove the layers and deconstruct our question, what does it mean to be alive? When looking into the behavioural patterns that humans tend to follow it was interesting to consider the doxa of the society they are in. While there were things that humans do collectively, when interviewing people, it showed that there were noticeable differences depending on age and gender. An example of this is that while the happiest memories for women seemed to be sentimental times spent with loved ones. The Men that were interviewed seemed to say answers referring to work or achievement. This poses the question of, is this an innate human trait and just a coincidence or is this due to the society they live within. Wyschogrod makes an interesting point when looking at deconstruction through this lens. They say,
'Differences in ontic framework enable the self to acquire its complexity and range from the primordial setting in which it attains separate existence to an ambience in which habitation, work, and cognition appear.' (Wyschogrod, 1989, 178)
We used this way of looking at it to deconstruct this concept further, we looked into humans as a body rather than a person it was really interesting to see how genetics play a part and the origins of the so-called instructions that humans follow. For example, the way that the body reacts to happiness or fear. It is in our bodies that react first before society has any influence on the matter. We used these innate natural emotional responses to influence the sections of the piece. Derrida’s concept of deconstructing was extremely useful to peel away the layers on the theme of what it means to be alive.
Tentacular thinking
Donna Haraway
The theory behind Tentacular thinking resonated with both of us in the devising process as we often began with a stimulus which then gave off further ideas and posed different questions to consider. This influenced our performative responses which subsequently evolved and changed the more ideas we created.
Harraway likens the process of tentacular thinking to a cats cradel in her book 'Staying with the trouble: making kin in the Chthulucene'. She says
'Two pairs of hands are needed, and in each successive step, one is “passive,” offering the result of its previous operation, a string entanglement, for the other to operate, only to become active again at the next step, when the other presents the new entanglement. But it can also be said that each time the “passive” pair is the one that holds, and is held by the entanglement, only to “let it go” when the other one takes the relay." (Haraway, 2016, pp.34)
Not only did the imagery of the cat's cradle inspire our first section of the piece but it sets the show up to portray the intertwining journey that we have throughout. The idea is that, as the thoughts evolve naturally, they are still shaped by what comes before and we used this mentality when devising content through this process. The show mirrors what comes before in little ways and yet still evolves. The entire process of making this performance had tentacular thinking to thank. We were constantly adding new ideas to the piece that mirrored other moments of the piece as the thoughts arose. This allowed us to have repetitive threads to aid us in our attempts to show that everything is connected.
Theatre and Memory
One of the themes that the piece touches on is memory and how sharing a memory can be just as live and present as it once was. Malkin says,
'Theatre is the art of repetition, of memorized and reiterated texts and gestures.' (Malkin, 1999: 3)
Historically, theatre and storytelling have gone hand in hand and this show is no different. The show shares the memories of many people (through the interviews) and allows us to get a glimpse at what makes them, them. It is a repetition of what has come before. We included the memories of others as well as our own to create a push-pull effect for the audience. They are drawn into the stories and memories they are being told but pushed away by the performative tasks Ben and I are doing simultaneously. It was incredibly important to us that we include other memories as well as our own in order to create a human connection with the audience.
In the book 'Psychoanalysis and Performance' by Campbell, P. There is a chapter, 'Staging social memory', by Taylor, D. In which they write:
'Historical and genealogical information has been, and continues to be, performed and transmitted through performed ‘memory paths,’ as anthropologist Thomas Abercrombie puts it, that access ancestral stories, hearsay, and eye-witness accounts.' (Taylor, 2001, 221)
Memory is ever-changing. The more it is remembered the less clear the memory becomes which in itself is a beautiful concept. Over time memories will fade keeping only key threads the same. We wanted to reflect this idea with the 'frame threads' we will use throughout the show. Humans connect over shared experiences and memories, and it brings a sense of security and comfort to both the teller and listener. Behaviour from our ancestors can be passed on through stories and it's really interesting to learn about what it is about memories and sharing them that makes them stick with another person.
From start to finish
Pre-set
Initially, we envisioned there to be a projection of life and nature on the floor as the audience entered. We will be playing in the shadows to set us in the world in which we are aiming to create. The entire piece touches upon different aspects of life and after reading 'Staying with the trouble: making kin in the Chthulucene' (Haraway, 2016) it was apparent we needed to incorporate even the forgotten aspects of life such as micro-organisms. The structure of the piece follows the pattern from birth to death and we wanted to show this through not only the projection but in ourselves playing the childhood game ‘cats cradle.’
Update
After receiving feedback from Kevin, he suggested that playing the game in the shadows was too much and it may be more effective to pull the two concepts apart. And in further exploration, while to us it symbolised childhood it didn’t reflect new life and birth and therefore ‘cats cradle’ was taken out of the section. We also decided that we want to begin out of the projection so as to not make a spectacle of the show and to give the appearance that we are just people like those in the audience. It is only when we hear the audio of an interview that we move into the space.
Other notable changes are that we have added calming nature sounds over this section and moved the projection to the back of the stage as this allows the audience to observe them more clearly as we are obstructing them less and allows us to use the whole space
Take my hand - Anchor points
This section was to show childhood and the idea of guiding a child through something they don’t know yet. This is where the idea of simplifying theories came from. When devising this section, we recorded ourselves teaching each other theories using simplified words. We narrowed down theories that worked and we wanted to recreate the feeling of confusion children feel when things don’t make sense to them, so we decided the theories needed to be confusing and nonsensical. The theories we used were:
The unknotting problem (Kauffman, 2016: 303)
General Relativity (Tillman, 2022: Online)
Flat Earth Theory' (Pappas, 2021: Online)
The tree of life (Wendigoon, 2020: Online)
We used hanging Perspex screens to draw diagrams to further help understand the nonsense. This also throws in the imagery of Covid, and the screens put in place during the uncertain times of the pandemic.
Update
We have scrapped the screens for continuity. They aren’t used again and are distracting when the projector is on.
We have also added movement influenced by the theories which will be repeated throughout. There are 3 movements, The throw, The string and The turning hand. These are meant to represent Gravity, string theory and the balance of life.
We also break out of the world we are making to liken ourselves more to the onlookers. We aim to break the fourth wall frequently and make it obvious that we are on a stage and not hiding that.
Make something - Auxiliary spiral
Originally this section was going to consist of us creating a spider’s web in the space through a string attached to us. However, after feedback from Kevin, we were told it was too on the nose and to approach the section from a more subtle angle. This made us reflect on everything we had made so far giving us the idea to use the performative responses. We stripped them back and used just remnants of them tying in the idea of memories and deconstruction.
We used the ‘response in song melody’ and used the ‘map’ drawing to create a pathway for us to explore different elements of life. For example, the four elements and the sounds of people. These were added to the melody.
From this score, we created an instruction for each individual sound. Which gave us a motif of movement. We layered this with a projection of all of the responses.
Update
We decided to remove the projection of our responses as it wasn’t serving the section and made it feel static. Instead, this was replaced with footage of people walking from across the planet. The simplicity of the action of walking is something most of us can relate to, bringing in the idea that this all connects us somehow.
Update
Originally when the projection was on the floor we wanted to play with the idea of people doing different things and them bleeding into each other. However, logistically this encapsulated us into the projection and we were interested in conveying the message of solidarity rather than us versus the audience. In my opinion, it actually benefited us to have the projector change location as it gave us more space to play in.
After another feedback session with Kevin, it was suggested it might be interesting to play with the movements that we had created without the melody and just keep the sounds. This worked in juxtaposing the movement and sound well and stopped the performance from feeling like a dance.
Another piece of feedback we were given was to add some interviews for continuity and depth. We decided against using the videos and instead used our own voices to voice the answers of others. This allowed us to break this section up and offered moments of stillness. We made sure we made a moment out of saying the lines so as not to lose them in the chaos of the section and also to bring the audience back in. Whilst also connecting with the audience, we wanted to make sure there was a relationship between the two of us and therefore needed to incorporate movement that connected us.
Time you laughed - The Capture Spiral
At first, we wanted to use our own stories combined with movement derived from the feeling of happiness. We wanted to show the playful nature of the relationship and still link it with memory. Simultaneously, we were doing a movement sequence and telling a story which proved incredibly challenging, and the decision was made to have our stories told over the Sound system alongside the song ‘alone in Kyoto’ which we had choreographed the piece to. In attempts to deconstruct the stories, we said them in the third person in order to warp them a little while keeping the true memory.
Update
We chose to change our positions in the movement piece as it allowed the movement to be embodied better and could, in my opinion, be more expressive. This also allowed us to use eye contact to further connect the two of us.
Kevin once again suggested that the music took away from the movement and suggested finding something that didn’t have a beat so we would have to find the connection with each other in order to do the movements. Another piece of feedback given was that the stories not being live took the humanistic quality out of it and therefore we changed it to us sitting in the audience telling the story just like any other person before moving into the space with props that correlate to the 'time you cried' stories. These props were soon scrapped as they didn’t have any physical need to be there and were instead replaced with the photo album and papers which will be used in the final scene.
Destroy something - Central Hub is Eaten
Originally, we were going to ask the audience to share a secret on a piece of paper before the show which we wanted to destroy. In this case, it would be the sense of secrecy that is destroyed, as we wanted to read them in the performance. However, Kevin made a very good point of the answers we would collect would be from a very small demographic and it would be interesting to see more answers. The idea of conducting interviews in advance came from this. Having the interviews offers a sense of fact and allows the audience to connect with more people rather than just us.
Update
We needed to offer something to ‘destroy’ the interviews, we chose to disrupt rather than completely destroy. Out of this idea came the idea of performing an endurance task. We needed to find a task that didn’t make too much noise and could be sustained for the length of the interviews (8 mins). We settled on creating a short repeatable motif of the movements we were already repeating throughout. It offered enough disruption without being overbearing, and the ‘destruction’ we were after was to our bodies from carrying this task out for a lengthy period.
Update
After another feedback point, we were told we also needed to tie it back in with the theories and so we decided to discuss different things about being alive once again bringing the focus back to the present. This allowed us to acknowledge the audience again as well as being present. It was also suggested that we cut the video down as it became quite repetitive and boring to watch. The dialogue we have after the interviews needed to mirror what comes before and after, so we used the phrase “I’ve been trying to understand …” at the beginning of every sentence before pulling on topics linked to the piece.
Time you cried - The Capture Spiral
This section lent itself to be non-naturalistic as we didn’t want to create an atmosphere where we told some sad stories and left it with that. Instead, we wanted to play with the emotion of sadness through movement. We wanted this movement to be slow to embody sadness and to highlight that this emotion is a normal part of life no better or worse than any other emotion. We used a technique we had learned earlier this year from Patrick Campbell where we found a way to the floor and back up without using our hands. Once comfortable we changed it so that we were moving so slowly that it isn’t noticeable that we are actually constantly moving. We used an instrumental piece of music ‘solitude’ as a guide for timing and added an audio version of us telling a story of a time when we cried. Having the endurance task before this section meant that our bodies were under extra tension and that was visible to the audience.
Update
We decided to replace the song with breathing sounds as the piece now didn’t have a place for a piece of music. We chose the breath sounds as it almost sounds like the breathing someone does when crying.
After another feedback point, we realised this section would be another good place to break out of the ‘world’ we had created. It allows us a moment to step out of the characters and just observe.
Leave
This section is a place of reflection. It symbolises the end of the life cycle and looking back on life. We wanted to show this through photos of us descending in age as we reset the stage as if to begin again. It begins with us lying in the projection, when a picture comes up of both of us at our current ages. we move out of the projection and we see pictures of ourselves till we are infants.
Update
When we changed the location of the projection, we decided to scrap the projection for this scene. Instead, we decided to have printouts of these pictures which we would scatter about the set. This paper is seen previously in the happiness scene. alongside this, I am looking at the album we also previously use.
This helped to tie things together neatly. we also decided that it would be nice to hear the memories of people while this is happening to make it clear that this play is once again not about us, it's about everyone.
We end with the lines "Are you beginning to understand now?" "No, not really." The aim of this was to offer some comfort in not understanding life and it being okay.
AI Art
Because our piece is highly visual, we wanted to add a more subtle images in our projections to avoid being too on the nose. I did a little research into AI generated art and experimented a little with what the generators thought concepts looked like. These were its creations. The names of the pictures are what concept it used to create it.
Because life is always evolving we wanted to keep an element of computers and technology. Once again these didn't make the final cut, but they were a really interesting medium to experiment with. The images that were generated once again sparked more ideas and thoughts that hadn't previously been considered. Such as the 'Sadness' picture had a slowness and non- humanistic quality to it which we wanted to play with. This in turn influenced the slowness of the 'Time you cried' section. To also draw attention to the non-naturalistic quality of the movement we also break out of it in order to acknowledge the audience.
The interviews
At first, our thoughts were to get the audience to write their favourite memories down on bits of paper before the show however after a meeting with our mentor we decided to take video interviews in advance of the production. This was to prevent the chance of not getting the answers we needed for the show and to also comply with the University's ethical policies.
The questions we asked during the interviews were:
How do we live a good life?
What makes you feel alive?
What keeps you grounded?
What does it mean to be alive?
What’s your happiest memory?
We chose these questions as we think that they are great at exploring the positive aspects of the human experience.
References
Dizikes, P. (2011) When the Butterfly Effect Took Flight. 22nd of February. MIT technology review. [online] (Accessed 4th of September 2022)https://www.technologyreview.com/2011/02/22/196987/when-the-butterfly-effect-took-flight/
Haraway, D. (2016) Staying with the trouble: making kin in the Chthulucene.[online] (Accessed on the 4th of September 2022) https://r1.vlereader.com/Reader?ean=9780822373780
Kauffman, L.H. (2016). ‘The Unknotting Problem.’ Open Problems in Mathematics. [online] (Accessed 4th of September 2022) https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-3-319-32162-2_8#citeas
Malkin, J.R. (1999) Memory-theater and Postmodern Drama. Ann arbour: University of Michigan Press.
Taylor, D. (2001) ‘Staging social memory.’ In Campbell, P. Psychoanalysis and Performance. Oxfordshire: Routledge. [online] (Accessed on 4th of September 2022) https://web-p-ebscohost-com.mmu.idm.oclc.org/ehost/ebookviewer/ebook/bmxlYmtfXzcyODQyX19BTg2?sid=4f87c2cf-4d74-4455-a8a3-d91cb3515029@redis&vid=0&format=EB&rid=1
Tillman, N. T. Bartels, M., Dutfield, S. (2022) Einstein's theory of general relativity. 5th of January. Space.com [Online] (accessed on 4th of September 2022) https://www.space.com/17661-theory-general-relativity.html
Turner, C. (2016) Jacques Derrida: Deconstruction. 27th of May. Critical legal thinking. [online] (accessed on 4th of September 2022) https://criticallegalthinking.com/2016/05/27/jacques-derrida-deconstruction/
Pappas, S. (2021) Are flat-earthers being serious? 16th of December. Live science.com. [online] (accessed on 4th of September 2022) https://www.livescience.com/24310-flat-earth-belief.html
Wendigoon. (2020) THE CONSPIRACY THEORY ICEBERG. [online video] (accessed on 4th of September 2022) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7I2KJL-gJPU&list=PLfeWBGty_481haNoS_ozOVdIyOpyXMjUC
Wyschogrod, E. (1989). ‘DERRIDA, LEVINAS, AND VIOLENCE.’ Derrida and Deconstruction. [online] (Accessed on the 4th of September 2022) https://ebookcentral-proquest-com.mmu.idm.oclc.org/lib/mmu/reader.action?docID=167816