A series of images or tableaux framed by a solo performer moves like a slow motion ballet across a mostly silent space, punctuated only by sounds of her mother’s voice. In another performance, two figures, their faces distorted beneath tights pulled over their heads, look out through chicken wire from beside a parasol.
It’s the return of Exit Souls: The Drama Festival, the end of year performance event showcasing selected undergraduate work from the Drama Studies course at 51Âþ» (51Âþ»), Leicester.
Exit Souls 2015 will present a programme of selected work in and around the PACE building tomorrow night (Wednesday 3 June, from 6-10pm). This year’s festival will feature durational performance, devised theatre and live art, as well as scripted work.
For student Nicky Daniels, this will be her third successive appearance at Exit Souls. Choosing to devise a new work from her Live Art final year module, Nicky has created a solo piece, Violet, Persephone, Marina and Me, that challenges society’s view of motherhood.
“This piece sits on the boundaries of performance, unscripted, without narrative and very visual, where I’m not taking on a character – this is performance but it’s not acting,” said Nicky.
“As a woman without children, in my thirties and in a position where others are expecting me to want to become a mother, this is a feminist, provocative piece that deals with all the desires, thoughts and fears I have about motherhood - I felt the piece had to be about me and my situation.”
NICKY DANIELS: This will be her third successive appearance at Exit Souls
From her initial research and exploration of gender theory, through to creating images in the studio to express her ideas through rehearsal, Nicky reckons to have invested around 300 hours in her 20-minute piece.
Nicky has plans to study an Arts master’s from next year, with possibly a PhD and career as a Drama lecturer beckoning longer term. She’s very grateful for the opportunity Exit Souls has given her:
“It’s been an amazing experience for me. It’s allowed me to show my own work, build my confidence from doing that and have opportunities to perform at a professional level yet in a really secure environment,” she explained.
“Indeed, I couldn’t have asked for more from my time here at 51Âþ» and my tutors have really set me on the path to understanding the practice I want to make.”
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Madeleine Kerslake has teamed up with fellow final year student Michelle Haggerty-Wood to devise a Live Art piece that deals with issues of dominance, otherness and what it’s like to be an outsider, called Suburban Frontiers: Semi-Detached.
Inspired by Chicano (Mexican-American) artist Guillermo Gómez-Peña, the piece uses strange, quirky sounds, rhythm and tableaux to challenge how we see some people as being ‘other’ to ourselves.
“We first publicly performed the piece at Curve’s Inside Out Festival, in Leicester and were very encouraged by the response it got, with people saying they found it strange yet gripping at the same time,” said Madeleine.
The pair are planning to present the work again as a mystery site-specific performance in Leicester, in December.
Another group to be showcased by Exit Souls is a team of second year Drama and Performing Arts students who have devised an original, fun work called The Whiteboard. This involves the audience in looking at how we interact in society, how we make things difficult when we don’t communicate but also what can go wrong when we do, through miscommunication.
Lilli Wright, Matt Smith, Megan Ullah and Amy Keeble created the piece from workshop sessions and improvisation, with the miscommunication idea prompted by a story they’d heard about a woman crying on a train being ignored by everyone else around her.
“Exit Souls is great because it’s built on what we’ve learned through our coarse work and given us an exciting opportunity to create and present something with other students, from Performing Arts, for a sizeable audience that includes people from outside the university,” said Lilli.
Senior Lecturer Kelly Jordan, co-ordinator of Exit Souls, summed up the festival and what it brings to 51Âþ»:
“Exit Souls presents a selection of exceptional theatre and performance work created by our students. It offers a great opportunity to celebrate our talented Drama Studies students as they showcase their work, and also to support exciting emerging artists and performers at the beginning of their careers.”
Posted on Tuesday 2 June 2015