Invisible Stains to leave mark on Melbourne audiences - Your chance to win tickets
"Life without memory is no life at all"
CREATED by the talented Theatre Company 09, under the strong and spirited direction of Tanya Gerstle, Invisible Stains takes the audience on a roving trip through a palimpsest of memories from the 20th Century - traced through intergenerational memory and impacting upon contemporary youth caught in a culture of instant gratification.
Fully produced by the School of Performing Arts' Production students, a minimalist set, five palette costume design and an eclectic live and sourced sound score will form the backdrop for this gritty and enthralling dreamscape.
A month before rehearsals, Director Tanya Gerstle threw down three provocations to the twenty-three graduating actors of Company 2009: Memory, Photography and the 20th Century. Initially, this took the students down many different paths: they researched periods of political upheaval and war, investigated personal testimonials of suffering, as well as a multitude of concepts behind the science of memory.
Over a period of many weeks the Company began to realise the dramatic potential of their newfound knowledge within the context of the 'black box'. Working with a training methodology developed by Gerstle called 'Pulse'*, intense and unyielding vignettes have been created, interwoven with dynamic ensemble work and text. The result is a non-sequential dreamscape where the 'company of death' is constantly apparent as more than thirty individual characters resonate through future generations.
* In New York in 1989, Tanya collaborated with Butch Morris, an improvisational jazz conductor and began her evolving research into improvisational performance structures and their application to theatrical performance practice. Pulse has developed as an improvisational tool for training actors to physically explore text. The roots of the training are based in challenging the performer to spontaneously respond to external sources and internal impulses, in an ensemble environment.
Season: Wed 21 - Sat 24 October, Mon 26 - Fri 30 October at 7.30pm
Tue 27 & Thu 29 October at 2.00pm
Where: Space 28, Performing Arts Building, 28 Dodds Street, Southbank
Cost: $20 / $12
Bookings: vcam-theatre@unimelb.edu.au
Enquiries: +61 3 9685 9225
www.vcam.unimelb.edu.au
Your chance to win a double pass to Invisible Stains!
Melbourne Alumni e-news has five double passes for Invisible Stains to give away, for the performance on Monday 26 October at 6pm. To be in the running, you'll need to be a member of the Alumni Web Community (AWC). For your chance to win, simply email alumni-office@unimelb.edu.au with your AWC '@alumni.unimelb.edu.au' email address in the body of the email and 'Invisible Stains' in the subject heading. If you are not yet a member of the AWC, you can register at www.unimelb.edu.au/alumni/awc.