Mottisfont Solo Exhibition

Dates: 5 May-5 August 2015

Abstract:

In 2014 Lizzie Sykes was awarded an Arts Council funded residency at Mottisfont, a National Trust property in Hampshire. Are You There, The Greeting (dance film + doc), and the live performance, The Secret Ballet, are outcomes of this residency, shown at this solo exhibition.

At the time of making the work, Mottisfont was undergoing a process of cataloguing, cleaning and archiving objects that had been in storage. Objects ranged from teapots to stuffed animals. These objects formed the basis for a set of new exhibitions in the building. In a National Trust house, just like in film, time is distorted and managed – narratives are reformed and selected slices of history and experience become forefronted, and others are quieter, camouflaged, unresolved or invisible stories that are edited out. As visitors, we inevitably are part of this shifting flux of presence and interpretation. Are You There is a dance film response to the interior of this historic home and the objects within it. The dancer is the embodiment of the feeling of perpetually performing, or being trapped in a kind of stasis, an artefact herself. The exhibition also features two films made with a group of older performers. These works celebrate the long standing use of Mottisfont as a creative meeting point in nature. Our films are the outcome of discussion about visibility, camouflage and working site specifically, we created a performance that's captured on film, as well as an accompanying documentary.

As well as this work, I collaborated with dancer Cathy Seago on a live site specific dance performance piece entitled 'The Secret Ballet'.

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Source: Manual