“HOW IS YOUR COSTUME AGENTIVE?”

Each material directs the costume design into individual pieces with unique sculptural and performative abilities, which in turn influences and guides the movement and characterisation of the performer.

BIOGRAPHY

Daphne Kartens is a Dutch costume designer based in Amsterdam. In her work she explores the concept of body sculptures to create experimental and innovative wearable art pieces. She often works with unconventional materials and combines the individual qualities of materials through experimentation with shape, structure and technology. She wants to explore and redefine the boundaries and possibilities of costume and wearable sculpture and translates the outcome of this into visual costume-based performances.

Daphne has a BA in Scenography from De Theaterschool, Amsterdamse Hogeschool voor de Kunsten (2013) and an MA in Costume Design for Performance from London College of Fashion, University of the Arts London (2015).

Lorraine Smith is a dance artist and senior lecturer at Teesside University. Lorraine was Artistic Director/Choreographer of Silversmith Dance Theatre (2006-2014) and a member of UK Arab dance troupe Al Zaytouna (2007-2014), touring contemporary productions in the UK and internationally. Lorraine graduated from University College Chichester with a 1st Class Degree in Dance Studies, holds a MA in Choreography from TrinityLaban and a PGCHE (HEA Fellowship) from Teesside University. Her passions include devising dance theatre and costume performance, which inform her research into the impact of costume on the performing body, costume as somatic tool, performance pedagogy, identity and ‘otherness’.

TITLE: SESSIONS #1, #3, #4

SESSIONS #1, #3, #4 was a collaborative visual costume research project between costume designer Daphne Karstens and dance artist Lorraine Smith. During a 5-day intensive session, the artists experimented with various (non-fabric) everyday objects on the (moving) body to create innovative costume pieces.

Varieties of (recycled) materials were used to explore sculptural and narrative capacities and the effect on the moving body. In each experiment, the quality of the material was used to direct the design and performance process. The experiments demonstrated how ‘simple’ everyday objects, such as bottle caps, plastic cups and cardboard boxes can be used in an abstract way to create innovative costume pieces, repurposing the material from ‘practical’ to ‘sculptural’. The outcomes also strongly highlight the potential transformative nature of everyday man-made materials into visually stunning costumes resembling organic forms that connect to current environmental and sustainability issues.

Essential in the design process was discovering the ‘sculptural essence’ of each material through experimentation, manipulation and structural repetition, and the heightened responsiveness of the performer towards the costume by engaging in the creation process.

The results of this project are an example of the potential creativity and innovation generated when the material is given agency in the design process.

IMAGE CAPTIONS & CREDITS

Costume Design: Daphne Karstens
Dance Artist: Lorraine Smith
Camera: Daphne Karstens
Editing: Daphne Karstens

“HOW IS YOUR COSTUME AGENTIVE?”

This costume’s ability to simultaneously interact with the natural environment and queer adornment makes it an embodiment of an imagined utopian revolution.

BIOGRAPHY

Louie Zalk-Neale is a queer artist and costume designer from Aotearoa/New Zealand. Their performance events are centred on costumes made from upcycled garments which clearly reference clothing, but invite adaptive use through the presence of illogical extra holes, straps, sleeves, fastenings and veils. Their often-interactive performances allow space for audiences to critically embody the absurdity of normalised experiences; with LGBTQI+ traditions supporting their practice.

Louie’s work has featured at Performance Art Week Aotearoa (2018), Home Movies (2019) with CIRCUIT Artist Film and Video NZ, and atMEANWHILE, and ARI where they are a lead facilitator.

TITLE: Stranding

The stringy veil blows around my body as I sit on the beach amongst sun-bleached seaweed and smooth pebbles, while the seabirds and people watch on intently.

In Stranding, I use the visceral embodiment of costuming as a tool to re-evaluate binary gender and bodily adornment conventions. I reach into both the social realm of queerness and the pervasiveness of ecological connection to express a grounded, queer way of being.

The costume is constructed from upcycled fabrics and is weighted at the bottom with rice. Its veil structure seems ritualistic and traditional but can’t be linked to a particular culture, time-period, gender, or purpose. Moving across the beach with slow, fluid gestures, I’m reminiscent of a stranded sea creature. In the context of the post-earthquake beach town of Kaikōura (Aotearoa/New Zealand) where Stranding was performed, the veil is reminiscent of a lampshade lurching and swaying in a seismic shake.

The act of performing allows freedom from many social restrictions. I embody a utopian world that doesn’t restrict individual expression; and as a post-disaster piece, the rebirth of new, better ways of being become increasingly desirable and realistic.

IMAGE CAPTIONS & CREDITS

Louie Zalk-Neale, Stranding, 2019, performed at Kaikoura Arts Festival, Aotearoa/New Zealand

Foto: Jennifer K. Shields (https://sharedlines.wordpress.com/)

“HOW IS YOUR COSTUME AGENTIVE?”

The material properties of my costumes and their design cause physical forms of restriction on the bodies; as such, movement is generated as a direct result of the responsive shared agency between the costumes and the bodies.

BIOGRAPHY

Olga Ntenta is an experimental scenographer that has been trained in engineering at the National Technical University of Athens and in scenography at the Royal Central School of Speech and Drama in London. Based in London, she designs sets and costumes for theatre and she is also working on personal and collective experimental projects as performance designer. Olga has given lectures and workshops on Scenography at the Royal Central School of Speech and Drama and the University of Athens. She has a particular interest in ancient Greek tragedy and its contemporary significance. In particular, she is seeking for new readings on tragedy through experimental scenographic practices. Those practices intersect with science, engineering, architecture and dance.

TITLE: Greek Precarious Body

“The body is outside itself, in the world of others, in a space and time it does not control, and it not only exists in the vector of these relations, but as this very vector.” (Butler 2009: 52-53)

Judith Butler conceptualizes the body as an entity that cannot be perceived without being affected by “others” (norms, social and political organizations that have developed historically and gained power); simultaneously, the body is also complicit to their development and function.

Fate is a theme that often occurs in ancient Greek tragedy. Especially, in the story of Oedipus, the conception of premeditation on human life is very explicit in the tragic story. I argue that there are parallels between what the ancients called “fate” and what Butler describes as “the world of others”, thus, I explore generic meanings from the myth of Oedipus, in contemporary terms via Butler’s concept.

I use the idea of the costume as a metaphor for all those “others” that control the human, but that are also affected by it. In practice, I design costumes that restrict the body in several different ways and by moderating experimental scenographic practices, I allow such interactions, through which I explore the notion of “the precarious”.

IMAGE CAPTIONS & CREDITS

Concept, Scenography: Olga Ntenta
Performers: Archie Backhouse, Celine Singharaj
Sound pieces: “O-Daiko” by Kodo, “Unwriting” by Lingge Ma
Filming: Simon Donger, Olga Ntenta
Video Edit: Olga Ntenta

“HOW IS YOUR COSTUME AGENTIVE?”

Materials, in this case wool, act as the starting point for creating the performance.

BIOGRAPHY

Pirjo Valinen has worked as a costume and set designer for Oulu Theatre and a freelance scenic designer since 1975. She has created a broad array of different work techniques using paper, and has been successful in applying them to theatre costumes.

Pirjo Yli-Maunula is the Artistic Director of the dance production company Flow Productions and is working in Oulu, North of Finland as a choreographer, performer and curator. She has collaborated with costume designer Valinen for many years, including their most recent material-based pieces Susurro (2013), Pessi & Illusia (2015) and Villa (2019).

TITLE: Villa (Wool)

Wool as a material has been in human use for millennia. The woolen thread is a bond that connects cultures across time and space, a means for human interaction with a harsh and sublimely beautiful nature. The age-old material becomes a counterpoint against the unethical practices of cheap mass production and the ideology of the dispensable. Wool has many souls, which the viewer can get to know also through a tactile experience.

IMAGE CAPTIONS & CREDITS

Foto: Janne-Pekka Manninen

“HOW IS YOUR COSTUME AGENTIVE?”

How costume and material trigger spontaneity and lead us to the unknown, which we always fear but which also sets us free. 

BIOGRAPHY

Silke Eva Kästner is a painter who lives in Berlin. She developed her mobile and performative approach while travelling to New York, Japan and India. 

The ephemeral, unpretentious quality of her materials makes them suitable for playful exchanges and improvisations with an active spectator, her painterly acts initiate a dialogue with accidental partners. In these carefully prepared moments, when spectator meets the material, the formal shape of the art piece transforms.

Besides her art practice, Silke works in interdisciplinary cooperation with dancers, scientists, philosophers and initiates intercultural projects, such as Kashmir. Point. Charlie a long-term exchange project with artists from Kashmir, which has been ongoing since 2010.

TITLE: Kitchen Paintings

I connected people of different cultures with a yellow/red plastic material with wholes of different shapes to explore the proximity of strangers. While traveling in Kashmir, India, I offered to play with it at a small village called Atnatang, at the University of Srinagar, in a orphans’ school and also at Ekta School of Drama.

Here, the kitchen became a stage of performance after sharing food in the evening.

I extended the content of the shelving system: the yellow/red plastic skin next to coloured bottles, casually found objects of strong monochrome colours, bowls and plates. Costume elements, the cape and a (bird) mask sewn together by the theater tailor.  There was a blue tiled kitchen area and a pink foam floor. The kitchen changed in a kind of collage of pictorial and daily elements. And even the actions of participants happened like parts of a time-based collage.

There were no director’s instructions, just my request to interact with the materials and the fragments of costumes. Actions were happening next to each other. Kashmiri songs changed the space, the photographer`s permanent flash light, the profane sound of washing the dishes after dinner were part of this improvisation. An attempt to share without insecurity and to feel the presence of all.

IMAGE CAPTIONS & CREDITS

Concept, camera, editing:  Silke Kästner

Thanks to all participants students of Ekta School of Drama and artists of Kashmir. Point. Charlie

2012, video, 34:40, Srinagar, School of Drama, Kashmir, India

BIOGRAPHY

Solveig Holthe Bygdnes is a costume designer. She was born and raised in Harstad, Norway, and has a Bachelor’s degree in Fashion and Costume design from Oslo National Academy of the Arts. After graduating in 2016, she has created costume designs for both theatre and art exhibitions. In Critical Costume 2020 she presents Girl 27. This presentation includes an excerpt of two of the seven deadly sins, Envy and Sloth.

TITLE: Latskap (Sloth)

Latskap (Sloth), inspired by one of the seven deadly sins, is seen from a young woman’s perspective of love. Latskap (Sloth shows how much effort it takes to say what you feel, and how easy it is to not say anything, and let everything flow away. The costume and fabric choices are used as an essential tool to get the right feeling in the image, and the silence under water increases the mood. The performers wear costumes, together with fabric in the water that turns into a painting of moving colors. Stills from the movie become self-contained images where the room, fabric and body become one.

IMAGE CAPTIONS & CREDITS

Solveig Holthe Bygdnes, Latskap (Sloth), 2019, video, 5:59
Performers: Ingrid Nordahl, Eli Vevang and Solveig Holthe Bygdnes
Editing: Solveig Holthe Bygdnes
Foto (above water): Ingrid Nordahl
Foto (under water): Solveig Holthe Bygdnes