Furthering my role as Festival Co-ordinator for Sting In The Tale, a festival of stories, I have been very inspired by working with storytellers and, as you can probably tell, it has already infused into my current art practice.
The art of oral storytelling, an ancient tradition of verbally passing on information and stories from generation to generation.
I met Michele O'Brien, an award winning storyteller in 2011 and we thought 'Hey let's collaborate', and this is indeed what we have done. Since the beginning of 2012 we have been working on the creation of a new fairy tale. Our pilot performance was this week as part of Sting In The Tale and we decided to have it as a site specific piece with Upton Country House as the backdrop. From here, our new storytelling theatre company has been born, Valise Noire.
Michele O’Brien and Hazel Evans present Valise Noire, an emerging contemporary storytelling theatre company. Introducing a new fairytale combining storytelling, visual art and the French language, performances for adults and children, exploring the fantastical and delicious darker side. Everyone loves shoes…. But what paths do they lead us down? Click on the images to enlarge
La
Fille et les Chaussures (The
Girl and The Shoes),
This
new
enchanting children’s' fairytale, transports the audience
from the rural countryside of France to vibrant Paris in a world of
glamour and beautiful shoes and story of love, courage and
understanding. This piece draws on the timeless classics of The Red
Shoes, The Wizard of Oz and Cinderella.
A contemporary piece of storytelling
for children combined with the visual arts make this a unique show
that will capture imaginations by exploring what happens when you put
on magical shoes.
In May we won an award to work with The Priest's House Museum, and work with the public making shoe stories, this informed the development of the visual aspect of the show. The museum would like us to come back and work with them again and also to perform the show for them.
The fairytale is now being developed into a two part show which will be launched at Lighthouse Poole on November 17th in the Studio Theatre. There will be one show for children and one for adults - you will see that we are greatly inspired by Grimm Fairy Tales... come and see for yourself!
The children's show draws on the timeless classics: The Red Shoes, Cinderella and The Wizard of Oz. It will engage the audience by using and hearing the French language and immersing them in French culture as well as interactive participation.
The adult show will draw from the current trend in erotic fiction of delving into the delicious dark side of the fairytale and exploring tensions between lust and entrapment. Through this technique one can find the tools to be strong enough to be oneself leaving the audience to debate when is pleasure, pain and pain, pleasure.
To - BOOK NOW - click on the links
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To see the photographers album, Sam Cooke, click here
http://www.flickr.com/photos/east_dorset_dc/sets/72157631319692024/
Sting in the Tale facebook
http://www.facebook.com/#!/stinginthetale
website
http://stinginthetale.org.uk/
Michele O'Brien website
http://www.micheleobrien.co.uk/
Black and white styled pictures of Hazel and Michele by Danika Westwood
http://danikaimages.com/
Performance pictures by Sam Cooke
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