What I Think About when I Think About Dancing
What I Think About When I Think About Dancing was a contemporary interdisciplinary project running from 16 November 2009 – 3 January 2010 at Campbelltown Art Centre in South West Sydney. For the project Campbelltown Arts Centre brought together 23 dance and visual artists from across Australia and internationally to engage in residencies, performances, an exhibition and publication.
With an extensive residency program and multiple new work commissioned, What I Think About When I Think About Dancing focused on supporting the development of new work and presenting artists' processes to the public. As part of the residency program, eleven artists created new works on-site at Campbelltown Arts Centre between 16 to 27 November, which were premiered at the project’s launch and forum. Participating artists included performance collective Brown Council (AUS), performance artist Rosie Dennis (AUS), composer and sound artist Cathy Lane (UK), choreographer Rosemary Butcher (UK) and Aboriginal cross disciplinary artist Christian Thompson (AUS).
These projects and their creators have been documented in the publication “What I Think About When I Think About Dancing”:
“What I Think About When I Think About Dancing more broadly includes residencies, new commissions, an exhibition and showings at Campbelltown Arts Centre that examine and respond to the intersections of dance and visual arts. This project is part of Campbelltown Arts Centre’s ongoing Contemporary Dance Development Strategy, which ambitiously aims to engage with contemporary dance in new ways and within new contexts through an ongoing program of collaborative commissions.” Lisa Havilah, curator
“What I Think About When I Think About Dancing...I think of studios and the relief of a blank room. I think of sweat, breath, backs of bodies, mirrors, light sources, floor surfaces. Of counting, visualising, patterning and re-patterning, of intangibility. I think of theatres: all darkness, light flares and dust. Of channelling, shape shifting, transformation and the vague possibility of flight.
I also think of criticism, heckling, discomfort, disappearance, power and likely failure.” Wendy Housten, Treason Against Reason
“As the project builds towards its crescendo, with the artists’ residencies, new works, showings and forum all still to come...At the end of this project I doubt if we will be more sure of what ‘dance’ is either. Another layer of associations, memories and possible forms will have been added to the complexity of our understanding.” Susan Gibb, Thoughts on Thinking About Thinking About Dancing
To order a copy of the Publication contact:
Campbelltown Arts Centre
Cnr Camden & Appin Roads, Campbelltown NSW 2560
PO Box 57 Campbelltown NSW 2560 Australia
+61 2 4645 4100
artscentre@campbelltown.nsw.gov.au
Campbelltown Arts Centre’s 2009 contemporary dance program has been supported with a $50,000 grant via the Australia Council for the Arts Dance Board Artform Development category and has recently been funded for the next stage of this work http://www.australiacouncil.gov.au/grants/amr/dance/dance_jan10
IMAGE:
Kate Murphy (2009)
Count Me In
Digital video still, single channel HD video installation with stereo sound
Courtesy the artist and BREENSPACE, Sydney
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