You’re History!: 30 years of Performance Space

You’re History!: 30 years of Performance Space

Performance Space has been at the forefront of presenting interdisciplinary contemporary arts performances for 30 years. To celebrate this milestone the You’re History! festival is being held.

You’re History! is a 12-day festival that will showcase a series of performances from some of Australia’s most innovative artists at Carriageworks.

Since its inception in the early 80s, Performance Space has sought to present groundbreaking theatre and performance art that steps outside the parameters of regular art disciplines.

“Basically for the last 30 years we’ve been interested in art that pushes outside the normal kinds of traditional boundaries of all these kinds of siloed ways that we talk about art as visual or theatre or contemporary dance,” says Bec Dean, co-director of Performance Space.

“We’ve been the space where that kind of practice has come to find a home,” she continues.

For 25 years, Performance Space operated as a venue on Cleveland Street and was prominent in the Sydney arts scene.

In 2007, they moved to Carriageworks on Wilson Street, a step that has attracted much larger audiences.

“In the last seven years we’ve moved away from the beautiful home that we had on Cleveland Street and moved into the much bigger but shared context in Carriageworks,” says Dean.

“When we left Cleveland Street, the previous year’s attendance was 6,000 and now the attendance to our programs both at Carriageworks and in other places is more like 60,000,” she says.

The move to Carriageworks prompted a transition in the way Performance Space operates.

From being a venue-based company they have now become a contemporary arts agency that connects artists with audiences, not just at Carriageworks but at other sites as well.

Dean says that because Carriageworks “wasn’t ours we were able to look elsewhere and look at different kinds of artists working in public space or that were working in the community.”

“I think it’s really important in Australian culture that we start to embed art experiences in daily life as well, instead of just going to the theatre and going to the gallery,” she continues.

A recent performance presented at a different site was I Think I Can, a multimedia, puppetry and theatre project held at Central Station.

You’re History! will occupy Carriageworks from November 20 to December 1 and has been curated by Dean and co-director Jeff Khan, who’ve put together a diverse program of performances.

“We’re taking over the entire space of Carriageworks and we have projects in every space. So at any given time you might be able to see three to four things during the day,” says Dean.

Box of Birds incorporates Tess de Quincey’s unique Bodyweather choreography with Anne Ferran’s photographic trilogy of 1940s psychiatric patients.

“Tess de Quincey is doing a beautiful site-specific work called Box of Birds which will be taking place in the first week of the festival,” says Dean.

30 Ways in Time and Space is a project that situates 30 different performances in the public space of Carriageworks, over the two-week duration of the festival.

“It’s a collaboration between Jeff Khan and Agatha Gothe-Snape in thinking about how to situate a bunch of very different kinds of performances in a such a vast space. How to frame them and make an intervention like that in the space exciting and visually interesting,” says Dean.

danse (3) – sans spectacle is an intimate performance of Rosalind Crisp’s choreography that sees a trio of dancers performing a stripped-back set of movements, which challenges the audience’s notion of dance.

Tele Visions is a live pop-up TV broadcast that is different every night.

“Tele Visions is an amazing program in the second week of the festival which is basically counting down to the end of analogue broadcast. They’ve curated a number of artists to present television programs during that week,” says Dean.

The Directors’ Cut program invites nine previous directors of Performance Space to curate an evening each. These events include screenings, performances and installations. They range from previous artists returning to recount their experiences of Performance Space to a Greek band with an ouzo party.

“I think for some people who have that history with Performance Space, they’re going to be really excited about going to see a particular director’s event,” says Dean.

This is Barbara Cleveland is a video work by the Brown Council, which traces the steps of Barbara Cleveland – the 70s Australian feminist – on her journey across Europe and the United States.

Brief Synopsis is a photography installation coupled with a large-scale musical and operatic performance about the stabbing of a young man.

“I think it will be a big night for us. Nigel Kellaway – who is directing that work – has been a real key figure in Performance Space’s history,” says Dean. (PG)

Nov 20-Dec 1, Carriageworks, 245 Wilson St, Eveleigh, free-$100 (You’re Pass!), performancespace.com.au

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