Thursday, December 22, 2011

Finally a Sky Space!

After years of following James Turrell's work, using him as a prime example in my BA thesis on light and space artists, always in search of exhibitions of his work in Europe and after seeing a great show of his in London earlier this year, at the Gagosian, last week, at last, I got to see Sky Space I in Varese, Italy. Part of a collection I had read and written about but had never had the chance to visit! 
It was worth the wait! An entire corridor of "light" architecture created from Dan Flavin's installation rooms, leading to Irwin's window cuts and not so imaginary walls, to finally arrive at Sky Space...




 

Saturday, October 15, 2011

Workshop "La cecità vedente"

With many thanks to all participants, Alessandra Fabbri, Ruth Zanella and all  those who publicized the 2-day workshop I gave last September at Magazzini Generali, Ferrara, Italy. In attendance to present "Blind Trust" here in town, after London and Brighton.
Click here for details on workshop.


Some images from 23rd and 24th of September









Friday, April 22, 2011

Blind Trust at The Basement, Brighton


BLIND TRUST (a participatory performance on the senses) at The Basement (Brighton), as part of the Supper Club on the 23rd of April.
Doors open at 7:30pm, tickets £8, conc. £6. Don't be late! Limited places available on a first-come-first-served basis. Looking forward to seeing you there!
BLIND TRUST is a one-to-one performance, in which audience members are invited to a 15 minute journey where the interaction with performers and being with oneself becomes a tool for perception, as vision and hearing are taken away to enhance awareness of what is tactile as much as what is only grasped by our sixth sense.
Concept, development, set design and presentation: Milka Panayotova
Original music: Giacomo Natali
Performing: Hamish MacPherson, Lydia Georgoula, Michael Kelland, Milka Panayotova
Approximate duration: 15 minutes



Friday, March 25, 2011

"Focus-Pocus" at Kinitiras Studio, Athens

A short while ago I applied for a performance contest organised by Kinitiras Studio, Athens, with he theme 'What I like about the crisis'. I ended up in the group of eight selected pieces, to present at the studio.
So here I am, in one of my favourite cities, presenting 'Focus-Pocus' for six nights, where a valid ticket for all eight performances gives the right to voting two of the works. 
Concept, development and performance: Milka Panayotova
Sound design: Giacomo Natali





The idea behind 'Focus-Pocus', as stated in my application:



Economic crisis is a time to be creative, a time to reflect, a time where you appreciate the little things and value what you have. I happened to spend my early childhood in the late eighties/ early nineties in a country of great economic difficulty. With recurrent electricity curfews, water shortages and general scarcity for everything, making the simplest the most precious, I couldn't think of a better way to have grown up into the creative and free adult I am now. True, I am still pretty moneyless, so my life is always in a state of crisis, but probably this is exactly what I need to keep it all going.

As a performance maker, working with movement and interested in audience participation, my idea for a short performance (estimated to 15 minutes) with the title
''Τι μ΄αρέσει στην κρίση'':

I like it that we all make more conscious choices and also focus on what really matters. So I am going to give that choice to the audience. They can view the performance with the help of little torches, while the performance space saves on electricity, why not? Low electricity bill and you still get to see a peformance. The audience gets the choice of seeing, not seeing , what to see and how to see it. They can focus on one part and forget about the rest, unite as a community and decide how the performance is to be viewed.

What happens on stage? The performer (myself), will execute a short choreography, inspired by the movement techniques of Butoh, around the idea of focus and concentration by using single body part movements and controlled breathing. Playing with the speed and pace of the shifting body from one point to another in space, responding to the interplay of lights coming from the torches used by the audience, the performer alternates movement and stillness, again to stress moments of spontaneity as opposed to concentration and focus.

The reciprocal influence between performer and audience within the space reflects the need, especially in time of crisis, to communicate with others in order to obtain what we want. On the other hand, we are also free to make choices individually, according to our needs and possibilities.