"What explosion of possibility happens when performance-makers connect with one another across cultures and communities in a whole range of ways, around performance-making for children?
The TuTwo Shows PROJECT is a 5 year, “proof of concept" venture between international communities, designed to test the potential of The PaperBoats platform.
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a 3 minute sampler of The Adelaide College of the Arts TuTwo Show
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austin, texas.
Following the making of the first TuTwo Show with the Adelaide College of the Arts, I headed off to Austin, Texas to participate in the beginnings of the US-based, TuTwo Show led by Dr Megan Alrutz, from the Department of Theatre and Dance at the University of Texas.
In cahoots with The PaperBoats, Megan has designed a course in "devising image-based theatre from a place of whimsy" (UT course summary)
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intimately connected
Even though she was in Austin, Megan was intimately connected to the development of The Adelaide College of the Arts TuTwo Show across its 8 weeks of creation, receiving daily reports supported by online conversations with Dave Brown.
Megan used her insights into the Adelaide process as a way to shape the provocations she offered to her UT ensemble to stimulate their making of modular performance content.
Stephen Blackburn, The PaperBoats New Zealand director, (pictured above with Megan) also followed the journey online and joined us in Austin to participate in Megan's project.
a typical daily report from adelaide
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austin and adelaide
The Adelaide and Austin ensembles met each other via a video conference call on the first day of the University of Texas process.
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a snippet of the adelaide-austin conversation
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time, money and resources
I arrived in Austin 6 weeks later, having followed the early stages of their process through well documented reports and videos.
The UT Ensemble had explored The PaperBoats seven principles of performance-making and had begun making performance segments by responding to provocations offered by Megan.
In my first meeting with Megan after arriving in Austin, we chatted about our perception that theatre for young audiences often ends up being unadventurous and mediocre because it's churned out with insufficient time, money and resources to support it.
We looked at what we were trying to do inside The PaperBoats model to address this dilemma and coined the term "cumulative, slow-brewing performance-making".
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cumulative, slow-brewing performance-making through partnerships
If we cumulatively build a pool of content and ideas in the making of each new iteration of The TuTwo Shows PROJECT and use them to build better outcomes, then this will have a cumulative impact.
The 200+ hours of the Adelaide College of the Arts work and the 70+ hours of independent artist’s work already completed in Adelaide is offered, absorbed and built upon by the University of Texas ensemble in the process of creating a US outcome.
The work in Texas, will in turn, feedback and inform ongoing work in Adelaide.
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first session in austin - a diary note
Last night, fuelled with these ideas around accumulation and invited by Megan to run a session, I used all that I know about “the performative-languages of receipt rolls” from my work with the Adelaide College of the Arts and Adelaide independent artists and used this knowledge to offer provocations to the UT ensemble.
I was able to compress 30-40 hours of "on the floor discoveries and refinements” developed with Australian ensembles into a 3 hour session with the University of Texas makers.
The outcomes offered by the UT ensemble to the provocation, "build a performance segment involving the creation of a house out of receipt roll paper”, were deeply pleasing, meditative and sophisticated.
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These distinctive Texas outcomes were created in a tiny fraction of the time because of the many, many hours of work that had gone before.
the double diamond process of creation
To support The PaperBoats performance-making process, Megan has adapted a creative process used by graphic designers.
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discover < The opening out part of the first diamond represents the intuitive, fanciful, playful and whimsical stage of our creative process where lots of content is generated through games, provocations, investigations and improvisations prompted by our activating statement - explore two-ness in every which way.
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FIRST DIAMOND < whimsical, intuitive, playful, fanciful
discover
- respond to provocations
- play, explore, invent
- accumulate performance segments
- develop performance modules
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define > Once a lot of content had been mustered, we begin to look for patterns, associations and connections. We select material that seems promising and string some segments together. This leads us to limit the palette and develop a notional order for the material we've selected.
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FIRST DIAMOND > reflection, dreaming, tinkering and thinkering.
define
- search for patterns
- string together some performance segments
- narrow the palette
- continue to make segments where necessary
- discover what sings!
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develop < With our loose "treatment" in place, we enter the second diamond. We play inside the treatment we've designed, jiggling and juggling the material with equal measure of whimsy and logic, play and analysis until we get to something that feels "solid".
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SECOND DIAMOND < focussing in, questioning, framing, shaping.
develop
- play with the framework material
- develop associations, expression and meaning
- define the theatrical vehicle for the content to live within
- shape the tension-release structure of the piece
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deliver > the "solid treatment" enters a rehearsal and trialing phase, where the work is deepened, refined and tested with audiences.
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SECOND DIAMOND > consolidating, deepening, simplifying, clarifying, refining.
deliver
- clarify and refine the theatrical form
- deepen the content
- shape the dramatic arc and sharpen the turning points
- rehearse and trial the piece
- deliver to audiences
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working with the austin ensemble
After Stephen Blackburn and I had introduced ourselves to the ensemble by offering some provocations of our own, our sessions under Megan's leadership began to revisit and develop some of their older content.
We used a favourite segment about nesting, birds and audience engagement to build some threads to see if that process revealed anything useful.
We began to define the palette and ask questions about what "endpoint" might be achievable in the time we had available.
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dramaturgy
In the 9th week of the course, Megan directed a dramaturgical process where the ensemble reviewed all the videos of segments they had created and selected some favourites.
They shared their favourites inside small groups and listed their choices on sticky notes.
They then discussed ways of putting some of these segments together into a performance thread.
They were encouraged to "let loved material go if it didn't fit".
The exercise ended with each group pitching their idea to the ensemble.
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a 1.5 minute video snippet from the dramaturgical exercise
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creating a "treatment"
This process of shared dramaturgy gave Megan an overview of all the modules that the ensemble were getting excited about.
Megan grouped these modules into 4 clusters. She divided the ensemble into 4 groups.
Each group was given a cluster "to develop" into a 6-8 minute performance outcome over the 4 weeks remaining in the course.
This marked the beginning of the second diamond in the double diamond creative process.
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the second diamond
Each group re-engaged with their cluster material by re-visiting the videos and discussing with one another how their segments might come together as a piece.
They conceived a framework for their pieces and started to put the segments together on the floor.
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Through questioning and analysis, trial and error, musing and dreaming, persistence and perseverance alongside the occasional happy accident, the pieces began to find their form, their meaning and their poetry. (image theatre is intrinsically poetic)
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The ensemble are now close to the end of their course and early in December, they will be showing their outcomes to an invited audience.
The groups are now in the final stage of their process - the rehearsal and delivery stage of the second diamond.
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goal achieved
With only 60 contact hours at her disposal, Megan's goal was to have the University of Texas, TuTwo ensemble experience the 4 phases of a Double Diamond creative process in developing their performance content using The PaperBoat principles.
The 4 performance outcomes will become part of the pool of material shared across the partnering communities in Adelaide, South Australia, Austin, Texas and Wellington, New Zealand.
These enticing beginnings will sew the seeds for the next phase of a US work-in-progress development.
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strong support from UT
A big nod of appreciation goes to the Head of School at the University of Texas, Department of Theatre and Dance, Dr Brant Pope, for his vision in supporting The PaperBoats venture.
Brant is researching a book designed to provide performance-makers with an insight into how The PaperBoats performance-making principles work in practice.
He recently spent a week in Adelaide viewing the Adelaide College of the Arts TuTwo Show and interviewing our artistic collaborators.
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Dr Brant Pope on "being specific"
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If you wish to respond, comment on, query, discuss or contribute to any of these ideas, please email me: dave@thepaperboats.com
To find out more about The PaperBoats please check out provocations 1 to 9 and view the website - http://www.thepaperboats.com
The PaperBoats is grateful to the partnership and support of the University of Texas, Department of Theatre and Dance and the Adelaide College of the Arts for their contribution to the development of this platform.
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This project has been assisted by the Australian Government through the Australia Council for the Arts, its arts funding and advisory group.
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