Imagined Touch program

Photo Credit: Ash McLellan

imagined touch JODEE MUNDY COLLABORATIONS | AUSTRALIA

IMAGINED TOUCH

JODEE MUNDY COLLABORATIONS | AUSTRALIA TRACK 8 CARRIAGEWORKS PERFORMANCES: 9–14 JANUARY INSTALLATION: 10–15 JANUARY 60 MINS

Performers, Collaborators & Consultants Heather Lawson & Michelle Stevens Creative Director Jodee Mundy Producer Stacey Baldwin Performers/Interpreters Marc Ethan, Georgia Knight, David Pidd, Mark Sandon & Dennis Witcombe Composition, Sound Design & Music Direction Madeleine Flynn & Tim Humphrey Set, Light & Visual Design Jenny Hector Technical Supervisor Taran Ablitt Production Manager Jenny Hector Stage Manager Jo Leishman Assistant Stage Manager Mia Donnet-Jones Deafblind Communications Consultant Dennis Witcombe Project partners Auspicious Arts, Arts Access Victoria, Able Australia, Polyglot Theatre NSW access partners Able Australia, Accessible Arts NSW & The Deaf Society Company Manager Amber Richardson Communications Guides Sarah Fitzgerald Antoinette Katzakis Ros Barnes Fiona Goldab

DIRECTOR’S NOTE We are so honoured to show Imagined Touch at Sydney Festival. What began as a community cultural development project, has now, five years on, evolved into a large-scale project created by a team of more than 20 collaborators.

In Imagined Touch: The Deafblind Live Art Experience audiences have the opportunity to see Heather and Michelle perform live.

In Imagined Touch: The Installation, audiences meet the artists on film and experience their stories through an immersive sound and light installation.

In the words of Deafblind political activist Helen Keller “the only way out is through”.

Every moment of both works has been created in collaboration with Heather and Michelle whose hands have felt thousands of hours in tactile sign interpreting, social haptic communication and braille.

In a world where we are bombarded with visual images and where individualism reigns, Heather and Michelle offer us expertise in the art of touch, connection and trust.

Our journey has challenged us to ask many questions. Is touch the most important sense? How do we keep Deafblind artists connected to the audience at all times? How can we reframe disability as an opportunity to share untapped expertise?

The language of touch shows us how easily sight and sound can distort one’s judgment when encountering another person.

Without sight or hearing, race, religion, ability, gender or the colour of one’s skin is simply irrelevant when all that matters is that the person offers a kind hand.

All people, with diverse sensory combinations, can experience this work in different ways. Inclusive arts practice, an emerging form, offers the opportunity to unravel our complexities and lay them out for all to witness.

We hope to awaken not only your senses but, also, to ignite the power to connect with others that lies in your head, your heart and your hands.

Jodee Mundy, Creative Director

ARTIST’S NOTE We needed to make a theatre show that tells the truth about being Deafblind. We want to share our humour, grief and our profound isolation to highlight the importance of human touch and tactile communication for Deafblind people.

Heather Lawson & Michelle Stevens, 3 March 2013

MADELEINE FLYNN & TIM HUMPHREY Madeleine Flynn and Tim Humphrey’s award-winning practice is driven by a curiosity and questioning around listening in human culture. In particular, they explore the dynamics and possibilities of sonic artistic form as they respond to different sites and architectures, both human and natural.

HEATHER LAWSON & MICHELLE STEVENS Heather Lawson and Michelle Stevens were both in the 2005 project Source/Sauce by Round Angle Theatre receiving multiple awards at the 2006 Melbourne Fringe Festival: The Visionary Award; The Go Full Tilt Award; and The Melbourne International Arts Festival Award. They both featured in Round Angle’s second project In the Dark, performing with Jodee Mundy. Heather, an emerging performer, won the Deafblind Got Talent contest performing her solo act Golfie featuring a white cane puppet. Michelle, a pianist, sat her Australian Music Examination Board AMEB Piano for Leisure Eighth Grade and is studying a Diploma of Music at Melbourne Polytechnic.

IMAGINED TOUCH: THE INSTALLATION

JODEE MUNDY Jodee Mundy brings together a wide cross section of collaborators and is fluent in Auslan and tactile communication because everyone in her family, except for her, is Deaf. Auslan is Jodee’s native language. After 20 years of theatre making in diverse communities and sign language interpreting around the globe, she has a method of creative practice that takes into account the power balances of all parties involved – the voices and lack of voices of all stakeholders. She established Jodee Mundy Collaborations in 2012 with the goal of asking: how we can do it, not just why.

JENNY HECTOR Jenny Hector’s lighting and set designs are driven by her collaborations and the space they find themselves in, crossing disciplines and investigating form.

40 MINS Performers and Collaborators Heather Lawson and Michelle Stevens Installation Director Jodee Mundy Installation Co-Director David Pidd Set, Light and Visual Design Jen Hector Composition and Sound Design Madeleine Flynn and Tim Humphrey Director of Photography Tom Chapman Installation communication guides Michael Katzakis, Mikaela Parker, Cindy-Lu Bailey, Stevie-Lee Bounader, Gloria Stead & Janelle Wallan Installation Guides Coordinator Sofya Gollan Audio Description Jodee Mundy Installation Technical Managers Tim Seconi & Nathalie Devilliers Thank you to all of our volunteers

SCENT OF SYDNEY

CARRIAGEWORKS BAY 19 INSTALLATION: 7–29 JANUARY TALKS: 10, 11, 17, 18, 24 & 25 JANUARY

AUSTRALIA | WORLD PREMIERE

CAN YOU REALLY KNOW A CITY BY THE WAY IT SMELLS? ARTIST CAT JONES DISTILLS MORE THAN FIRST IMPRESSIONS AND SEEKS TO CAPTURE THE REAL SUBSTANCE OF SYDNEY – ITS STORIES OF LANDSCAPE, DEMOCRACY, RESISTANCE, COMPETITION, AND EXTRAVAGANCE.

Photo: Cat Jones