this fleeting, gentle, persistent action is concerned with interruption and continuous movement (running). It addresses what is not seen and with the way that imagination works when one witnesses the repeated presence, then absence, of a physical body, over time
(to) constantly vent, Mirror City 2015 @ The Hayward Gallery, London
photos: courtesy of the Hayward Gallery
The work has been shown as a group piece and as a solo score and in the context of;
a 4 day dance festival (original group commission at What_Now 2013)
a one day symposium on process, (solo at the Performing Process Symposium in June 2014;
a 3 day conference; ‘Dancer as Agent’ (at DOCH, Stockholm in November 2014)
Here, the work was curated by Chrysa Parkinson and Frank Bock, It was performed by a group of dancer runners across all 3 days of this conference. The following links take you to documentation, testimonials and writings that relate to Vent at this conference.
a 12 week exhibition (solo as part of Volumes Project collective in Mirror City at the Hayward Gallery on the South Bank, London from October 2014 to January 2015)
one witness describes (to) Constantly Vent as having ‘a radical disregard of convention’ … (MacPherson Hamish at What_2013)
A solo figure runs a continuous circuit, passing through the event or occupied space and extending into the neighbouring cityscape. The activity is traceable in her/ the running body as she/ they gather(s) sweat, endures tiredness and sheds excess thought.
In the event her/ the figure is fleeting, marking time, bringing with her/ them as they/she passes through felt glimpses of the wider landscape. When the runner/ she disappears they/she do/ es not stop, but for those left in the gallery it continues as imagined, heard softly somewhere until she/they interrupt(s) once more.
The runners have a live phone line in their pocket as they run – this is fed back to a phone connected to speakers in the space where the run through will happen intermittently – so the running is heard constantly and seen only fleetingly.
Hetty Blades and I wrote Running, Resistance and Recollection, A conversation with ourselves through Time. This article discusses memory, practice and relationship through the experience of performing Vent. It was published in Performance Philosophy in 2017.
Katye Coe 