GHISLAINE HOWARD
|
Actor in rehearsal Acrylic on canvas 91cm x 183cm 36" x 72" |
GHISLAINE HOWARD
|
Actor in rehearsal Acrylic on canvas 91cm x 183cm 36" x 72" |
| In 1994 Manchester was designated the Arts Council's City of Drama. I became involved in recording some of the various theatrical manifestations that took place as part of this event. |
| I worked with the Royal
Exchange theatre company, Contact Theatre, the NIA Centre and Manchester
Metropolitan University and concentrated not only on the final performances
but on every aspect of the preparations, being particularly drawn to those
moments when the actors were warming up for the performance, conscious
and unconscious movements and gestures, when the public and private aspects
of the actors were most apparent.
The Narrator, Threepenny
Opera
Contact Theatre 1994 |
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Having spent time in the
enclosed worlds of hospitals and prisons where very real and dramatic situations
were the norm, here was a world in which the real and artificial were inevitably
intertwined. A place of high emotional and dramatic intensity; the energy
of the rehearsal room with its moments of release and control, the juxtaposition
of spontaneous actions and strictly controlled ones was a continual source
of inspiration to me.
Dancer stretching
1997
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Dancers embracing (red) 1998
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Actors embracing (blue) 1995
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| The finished work was exhibited
at the British Council and as a result of my involvement with director
Annie Castledine I was invited to record her production of Women of
Troy at the Royal National Theatre in 1995.
Movement rehearsal,
National Theatre
Oil on canvas 30" x 24" 76cm x 61cm |
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Dancer stretching 1996
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Dancer in rehearsal
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Acrylic on canvas 24" x 18" 61cm x 46cm |
| The experiences of the high artifice of theatrical
performance and the reality of the preparations for final production paralleled
in a curious way the atmosphere of the hospital and prison. There, too,
the grouping of people drawn together for shorter or longer periods of
time led to intense personal relationships of particular kinds. The willed
or unwilled expression of physical and emotional energies and the subsequent
dependencies and interactions between individuals all fuelled my imagination
and fed into my growing concern to develop my ideas for the Stations
of the Cross paintings and drawings.
Ghislaine Howard
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Women of Troy 1995
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Actor in rehearsal
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Actor undressing 1994
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