What is Solo Performance?

Solo Performance: PA3402

WEEK ONE:

January 25 2012

• Creating meaning from how outside issues affect personal issues.

I think solo performance is a performance that is performed by a single person on stage, whether it is a monologue, stand-up comedy, a dance such as ballet, or a poem recital. It is an unexpected journey into the self because I think that when making a performance most artists are shocked at what they find out about themselves and it also about being comfortable about who you are and be able to share it with other people. It can be adapted or interpreted from someone else’s work, or something the performer wrote. Solo performance to me is a piece of work that a single person has taken and made their own, adding their own personality and meaning to the piece they are performing. To perform solo a person has to be comfortable within their own skin, allow themselves to extend from their comfort zone and be open to embodying someone else’s characters.

Ontological – refers to oneself/the individual
Epistemological – Refers to the universal/things that happen around us.

In the preface of the book Extreme Exposure, Editor Jo Bonney uses the term "solo performance" to encompass those performers who do not necessarily have a comedic history. She suggests that "at the most basic level, despite their limitless backgrounds and performance styles, all solo performers are storytellers" (Bonney 2000: xiii). This assumption is based on her assertion that a number of solo shows have a storyline or a plot.

• Jo Bonney explains solo performance as:

The process starts very early on with the initial ideas of what the show is going to be about, who the voices will be, and how those voices come together thematically and rhythmically. (Bonney : 60)

Types of Solo Performances:

‘Stand-up/ Comedy, monologue, rapper, music/musician, poetry/monologue slam, autobiographical writing/storytelling, dance, magician, speech ceremony, spoken word, online (blog), live art, art, solo theatre, mime, multiple character/persona, sports (like golf), interviews, preaching, news/weather presenter, lecturer/teacher, gymnastics, ice dancing, sports dance, free running, martial arts, skate boarding, biking (BMX), stripper.’ (Andrew Chetwynd 2011)
Within the lecture today we looked at what solo performance is and who are different solo artists.

• Franco B:


He is a visual (blood) artist because he uses his body as a form or art. He tends to cut himself and walk along a white canvas trailing blood as he walks, in a sense leaving a part of him on the canvas.


From his website: (http://www.franko-b.com/) he states:

I'm essentially a painter who also works in performance. I come from a visual art background and not “live art” or theatre, and this is very important to me as it informs the way my work is read. In the last 20 years or so I have developed ways of working to suit my need at that particular time, in terms of strategy and context, by using painting, installation, sculpture, photography, video and sound. (Franko B 2011)

To me this is a type of solo performance because he works on his own and expresses himself in a way he feels comfortable.


• Marina Abramovic:


Marina Abramovic’s work is can be classified as a solo performance because she uses her body as art and performance. She is a ‘live’ artist and a lot of her work incorporates the audience’s participation. Within one of her performances she invites the audience to do whatever they wish to her. Even though there are other participants within the performance doesn’t make it a collaborative because the ideas of these performances are Marina Abramovic’s and she is the centre piece of each performance.

Marina Abramavic is said to have ‘pioneered the use of performance as a visual art form. The body has been both her subject and medium. Exploring the physical and mental limits of her being, she has withstood pain, exhaustion and danger in the quest for emotional and spiritual transformation.’ (Sean Kelly Gallery 2012).

The feature length documentary, Marina Abramovic: The Artist is Present, premiered in January 2012 at the Sundance Film Festival.

http://www.skny.com/artists/marina-abramovi/

In 2010 the Museum of Modern Art (MOMA) in New York had an exhibition entitled ‘The Artist is Present’ which displayed the work of Marina Abramovic, which included ‘…approximately fifty works spanning over four decades of her early interventions and sound pieces, video works, installations, photographs, solo performances, and collaborative performances made with Ulay (Uwe Laysiepen).’ (MOMA 2010).

http://www.moma.org/visit/calendar/exhibitions/965

• Deborah Hay:


After our discussion in class about whether Deborah Hay’s teaching/ method that is used by those taught within her method can be classified as a solo performer I would say yes. The reason for this is that even though these performers are learning someone else’s method they are still individuals regardless of the intensity of the course they are doing. A person may learn certain techniques and ways of doing things but they bring their own personality and interpretation to the work at hand. So even though they are learning Deborah Hay method when they perform their piece it is going to be something entirely different. And they themselves are still the only person performing the work.

‘Hay was a member of a group of experimental artists that was deeply influenced by Merce Cunningham and John Cage. The group, later known as the Judson Dance Theatre, became one of the most radical and explosive 20th century art movements.’ (The Deborah Hay Dance Company 2011)

http://www.deborahhay.com/

With regards to artists using or learning methods from other performers or practitioners for a performance they are to perform solo, I would still consider it a solo performance because the performer is performing by themselves even though they may be using techniques developed and used by another person. I say this because if you take someone who is trained in method acting, as an example, even though they have learnt the method they are using from Chekhov, Strasberg, Meisner, etc, they alone are the ones performing using their own body as an instrument and they alone are the ones who are showing their interpretation of a performance.

Solo artists use many different means of performance, such as, documentary, political, personal, and autobiographical. This is the artist taking that means of performance and either embodying a character/characters from someone else’s past and replaying it out to an audience or simply taking their own experiences and using that as a performance. I think documentary and political performances can be said to be taking situations and issues that are universal to us and telling it from their own view point of the situation. Using your own personal and individual stories within a performance means opening oneself to the world and being able to be comfortable in your own skin and your own individuality. It is like sharing a secret with everyone and allowing yourself to become vulnerable and ‘naked’ to your audience. It is letting the world see deep into your soul and straight to your core.

Creative Exercise: Impossible Task:


We did a variety of exercises in which we had to copy an action that one person has done and so it as close to how they had done it. However as we went round the circle the action/shape that the first person had done changed into something else that by the time we had reached the first person again their action was completely transformed. The reason for this is had to do with:

• Body structure/ Physicality: depending on whether it was male or female the action changed because
• The interpretation by the next person
• Personality
• Comfortability

We then were split in to two groups and paired off, and we had to think of an impossible task that not everyone could do and then get the class to try it out. While showing the class our impossible task we were told to think of things that will make it more interesting like moving about instead of standing still, playing with momentum and speed.

Doing simple things like sitting in the dark with a spot light or using repetition can be used within solo performance. It has to be something that is going to keep the audience wondering what is going to come next, like doing something that they will least expect. Such as the exercise we did, using impossible ways of doing something and then adding elements like time and speed is a way of seeing how long and fast you can go doing the same task. You can also play around with elements of physical theatre.

(http://www.goatislandperformance.org/goatisland.htm)


A Chicago based group known as the ‘Goat Island’ is a good example of using impossible elements to put on a show. As a collaborative they write, document, research and choreograph work and then they ‘perform a personal vocabulary of movement, both dance-like and pedestrian, that often makes extreme physical demands on the performers, and attention demands on the audience.’ (2009).

http://www.radiolab.org/2011/oct/04/

From the podcast ‘Loop’ that I listened to in class the performers used text, speed, time and stamina to put on a performance. One performer says ‘Kristen Schaal is a horse, Kristen Schaal is a horse, look at her dance, look at her go, look at her dance like a horse.’ Even though it was just sound the performance was interesting because once the text was being spoken the speaker kept speaking faster and faster that in the end the words just mashed together and it was harder to understand what he was saying, however the other performer was acting and dancing like a horse and as the text got faster so did the dancer/performer. The longer the speaker went on the longer the dancer had to continue. What made it interesting just listening to it was to see how long the speaker could continue speaking and how fast he could get before running out of breathe and getting tired and also how long the dancer could endure till she had to stop.

Richard Pryor is a black comedian. 'His subject matter includes black life on the streets, the drug culture, sex, and other topical issues, including the many tragedies of his own life (cocaine addiction, tumultuous marriages, killing his car, two heart attacks and quadruple by-pass surgery, and the famous incident of setting himself on fire from which he suffered third degree burns over 50 percent of his body ).' (Richard Pryor)

In class we had a look at a bit of his work. He is considered a solo artist because he talks about personal issues such as 'his wife leaving him,' and also other issues surrounding his community, ethnicity. In a way you can say that his work is documentary solo performance because he documents memories from himself and those of other people.

(http://richardpryor.com/welcome.php)

Reading One:

Kalb, J. (2001) ‘Documentary Solo Performance: The Politics of the Mirrored Self’ Theatre, Vol. 31.3, pp. 13-29.


• Some pieces of solo performances use political aspects with reference to Brecht whose work uses political theatre.
• Solo performances also use aspects of things from history and use them in their work, such as documenting events.
• Solo artists tend to use their own experiences, fears, anxieties and fantasies to create ‘alter-egos’ of themselves and sometimes the characters they create is how they see themselves and their lives.
• Other solo artists use experiences from other people’s lives such as Anne Deavere Smith who used to interview, record and research stories of other people to use within her performances, and these people a willing to share that history and their way of life.
• Solo performance, is of course, a field rife with self-indulgent and incipient monumental egotism.
• Solo shows are built on individual stories, and the choice and handling of those stories determine the art’s political strength.
• Most politically vital groups voluntarily ghettoized their creative and political energies by playing only to select communities defined by ethnicity, party, gender, or geography.
• Documentary solo performance is a search for a freshness and unpredictability that carry the force of gossip, for powerful topical narratives that are not so easily dismissed or second-guessed.
• We do seem willing to listen to people’s individual stories as possible keys to our own individual development – and that is the narrow political opportunity the solo performers exploit.
• ‘Fires in the mirror’ and ‘Twilight: Los Angeles, 1992,’ were both based on the same techniques: interviewing large numbers of people about the selected tumultuous events and then impersonating some of them on stage, using their exact mannerisms.
• Solo artists foil invisibility and stigmatization, and though the reasons their subjects are invisible and stigmatized differ in each case, the basic strategy is always the same.
• Solo artists turn the mirror into the political tool, providing the audience with opportunities to identify with the other through a transformed single individual and this bring the power of the mirror to the representation of otherness.
• Hoch stresses that his characters are his own inner monologues drawing from his family, his neighbourhood and his people.
• Solo performers must negotiate the terrain of guilt, mined though it is, but they have an important edge in accomplishing that: the transparency of their self-reference.

‣ In this article, Kalb is searching for the possibility of political theatre in the United States.
‣ Kalb uses the idea of Verfremdung, derived from Brecht, and which is translated, generally as
‘alienation effect.’ Verfremdung is meant to create distance between the audience and what is
on stage, rather than drawing the audience into ‘believing’ in the characters or sympathising
with their stories. In doing so, it draws attention to the fact that the circumstances of the
characters aren’t natural, but created through oppression, economics, and uses of power (and
therefore can be changed).
‣ He refers to Guy Debord’s concept (1967) of the ‘Society of the Spectacle’; Debord argues that
images and representation have replaced authentic social life and interaction. For the purposes
of this article, the most important point to draw is that for in the Society of the Spectacle, we are
more concerned with our own image and individual sense of self because we do not fully
identify with the other.
‣ Solo artists, including Deavere Smith, who link ‘compassion and identification with an objective
scrutiny in a way that, though Brecht might not have approved of it, amounts to a new,
peculiarly American form of individualistic Verfremdung.’
‣ The San Francisco Mime Troupe - City for Sale - the performance style seems to ‘over-alienate.’
‘The technique seemed to apologize for the material’s complexity, like a set of children’s theatre
blatancies arbitraily imposed on a subtle, adult tale.’
‣ Hellman, Odets, Miller - the political theatre of analogy and metaphor. We can connect this to
Boal, in the sense that their plays, by transposing an urgent political issues onto a metaphorical
story, allows the spectators to feel compassion and sympathy, but does not allow them space
to question their own beliefs. See http://www.childrenshourtheplay.com/ currently running in the
West End, and its marketing, reviews, &c.
‣ But, as Kalb questions, is Brecht’s idea of alienation any more successful?: ‘His parables come
off more as didactic exercises in oversimplification than as fervent efforts to make the world
appear changeable (the theoretical basis of Verfremdrung)’ (p. 15) (Chow, B, PA3402 Session 3: Seminar notes)


Reading Two:


Deavere Smith, A. (2000) ‘Extreme Exposure: An Anthology of Solo Performance Texts from the Twentieth Century, ed. Jo Bonney, New York: Theatre Communications Group. pp. 177-185.


• Anne Deavere Smith uses other people’s stories within her performance but interprets them according to issues of race, riots and other issues facing the people at that time.
• She doesn’t just observe and document events she brings them to life and plays the people who are the events.
• For her performances she first studies her subjects every move and idiosyncrasies so that when performing their stories she can add their personal touches to make her performance look more real and therefore invite the audience to share in the journey of the storyteller.
• In ‘Twilight: Los Angeles,’ the story is written from the first person’s perspective but you can tell that the writer wrote it the way it was told and not changed it to suit herself because the way the language was written you could tell that the storyteller was not an American and didn’t speak English very well.
• She raises issues of racism and speaks about problems faced by the minority races within America and how immigrants are less favoured or not given any help by the government.
• In a way her performances allow for people to show/share with others the way they have been treated, their thoughts and the questions they develop from that treatment.
• In ‘Twilight Bey: Limbo,’ you can tell that Anne Deavere Smith was speaking personally because it talks about feelings of how the twilight is like her because of her complexion and that’s how she feels is more like her.

http://www.annadeaveresmithworks.org/


Anne Deavere Smith is an actress, playwright and educator who cultivate artistic excellence that embraces the social issues of the day.

‘[The] mission [of Anne Deavere Smith Works] is to create an international community of artists and thinkers – to convene – to share work – to produce new works – to inspire new models for how art is created, exhibited, marketed, shared. We seek to affect the ways that the new generation of artists are trained: combining both virtuosity and excellence with content that responds to the immediate and current world.

Building on the powerful theatrical form that Anna Deavere Smith has invented and nurtured, and her commitment to using that form to address social issues, we are revisiting assumptions about where artists belong and their role in civic discourse. At the same time, we are galvanizing vulnerable communities and empowering them to author their own narratives and help solve the problems they confront daily.’ (Anne Deavere Smith Works 2012)


Reading Three:

Hoch, D. (2000) ‘Extreme Exposure: An Anthology of Solo Performance Texts from the Twentieth Century, ed. Jo Bonney, New York: Theatre Communications Group. pp. 354-362.


• In Hoch’s play ‘Some people,’ the way the character Blanca is written you can tell that Hoch really paid attention to how Puerto Rican people speak because just from reading it you could tell the character ethnicity.
• I away his portrayal of this character is observational because you can see he noted the way Puerto Rican people speak.
• Also I think that he addresses some issues that universal and the way many people think regarding sexuality, and the view of the world.
• With the character Bronx he uses this character to tell a story about poor, minority people in America and the discrimination that they go through.
• Hoch uses his plays to talk about issues that is universal and maybe some-what connected to his own personal life.

http://www.dannyhoch.com/


Danny Hoch is an actor, playwright and director. In 2000 Mr Hoch founded the Hip-Hop Theatre Festival which has since presented over 100 Hip-Hop Generation plays from around the globe and now appears annually in several American cities.

The play ‘Some People’(1994) includes excerpts from the many different characters that he talks about including sixteen year old hip-hop artist Floe, a twenty-ish office worker Blanca, a Jersey pseudo-yuppie Bill, Cesar a fifty-ish man who visits a psychotherapist for the first time, Kazmierczack a handy-man, and Doris a mother-in her fifties.

In Jail, Hospitals and Hip-Hop (1997) includes characters Bronx in his in mid-twenties, Flip a white teenager trying to act like a hip hop artists, Sam a correction officer in his thirties, Andy a guy in his forties, Victor a guy permanently on steel crutches.
Other work by Danny Hoc includes: Pot Melting (1991), Up Against the Wall (1999), Till the Break of Dawn (1997) and Taking Over (1999) where all unpublished except for Clinic Con Class that was published in 1997.


Reading Four:

Bogosian, E. (2000) ‘Extreme Exposure: An Anthology of Solo Performance Texts from the Twentieth Century, ed. Jo Bonney, New York: Theatre Communications Group. pp. 108-118.


• Eric Bogosian embodies many characters at a time and his performances are based either on observation or of confession.
• His embodiments are figures observed from the outside but whose feelings are projected from within.
• His work is universal and is used in so many different countries and performed in many different languages.
• He becomes his characters with such passion and intensity that make some people afraid of him.
• Because he uses his own experiences and observations of people and things he is able to assert his personal feelings and emotions into his characters.
• In Sex, Drugs and Rock & Roll, the way the play has been written shows that the character is speaking out of desire for things he wants out of life.
• I think this play is probably written from personal experience by Eric Bogosian because it comes across as someone’s inner thoughts and longing for life to be better.
• It could also be something that he may have experienced when he was younger and now at an older age is longing for that familiarity; this comes across very strongly within how the play was written.
• Later on in the text it speaks about him being an artist and how artists are meant to struggle because that is what being an artist is all about, but he also talks about how he wants to become rich and famous as though he is tired of waiting around for his big break, he wants it now.
• He also talks about being respected for becoming successful and making something out of his life. So basically this play is about his own thoughts and longing, personal reflection.
• ‘Pounding Nails in the floor with my forehead,’ this is more about his experience with performing in front of the audience and also his own observation of maybe when he himself was an audience member and his reactions to watching a performance.
• ‘Rash’ from the way it is written you can tell it is observational, the characters that are spoken about here were made up from the writers observations of people, the things he hears about in the news. It is combining universal elements together.


http://www.ericbogosian.com/


ERIC BOGOSIAN is the author of three novels, several films and numerous award-winning works for the theatre. BOGOSIAN is also well-known for the six Off-Broadway solos he wrote for himself between 1980 and 2000. For these he was awarded three OBIE awards as well as the Drama Desk. The solos, including "Sex, Drugs, Rock & Roll" and "Pounding Nails in the Floor with Forehead" are produced around the world and have become a mainstay of the American theatre repertory. (Bogosian, E 2005)

Plays and Solos:

1. Men Inside
2. Funhouse
3. Drinking in America
4. Talk Radio
5. Sex, Drugs, Rock & Roll
6. Notes From The Underground
7. Pounding Nails in the Floor with My Forehead
8. Suburbia
9. Wake Up and Smell the Coffee

10. Red Angel
11. Humpty Dumpty
12. Griller
13. This is Now!
14. Bitter Honey
15. 1+1


Bibliography:


Bogosian, E. (2005) Eric Bogosian
http://www.ericbogosian.com/ (Accessed 30 January 2012)
Bonney, J. (2000) Extreme Exposure: An Anthology of Solo Performance Texts from the Twentieth Century, New York: Theatre Communications Group.
Chetwynd, A (2011) Solo Performance 2011; Blogger
http://andrewchetwyndsoloperformance.blogspot.com/2011/02/types-of-solo-performance-to-look-at.html (Accessed 29 January 2012)
Chow, B, 'PA3402: Session 3: Seminar notes,' UELPLUS (Accessed 29 January 2012)
Franco, B. (2011) http://www.franko-b.com/(accessed 26 January 2012)
Goat Island (2009) http://www.goatislandperformance.org/goatisland.htm (Accessed 29 January 2012)
Hay, D. (2011) The Deborah Hay Dance Company,
http://www.deborahhay.com/ (accessed 29 January 2012)
Hoch, D. http://www.dannyhoch.com/(Accessed 30 January 2012)
MOMA (2010) Marina Abramovic: The Artist is Present,
http://www.moma.org/visit/calendar/exhibitions/965(accessed 29 January 2012)
Radio Lab (2011) Loops,
http://www.radiolab.org/2011/oct/04/ (Accessed 29 January 2012)
Richard Pryor
http://richardpryor.com/ (accessed 29 January 2012)
Sean Kelly Gallery (2012) ‘Marina Abramovic Biography,
http://www.skny.com/artists/marina-abramovi/ (accessed 29 January 2012)
Smith, A.D (2012) Anne Deavere Smith Works: A Place for Artistic Excellence and Social Change.
http://www.annadeaveresmithworks.org/mission (Accessed 30 January 2012)
Weiner, W. (1999) Jo Bonney: New Every Moment, American Theatre, Vol. 16, Issue 2, New York: Theatre Communications Group.