What's On / Performing Arts

JULY 2007

An in-conjunction event of ISEA 2008 :
n.E.W.S.

news

n.e.w.s. is a horizontally-organised, cumulative knowledge-based website for contemporary art and new media framed by curatorial contributions from around the globe, bringing together voices and images from North, East, West and South. n.e.w.s. reflects geographic
diversity and facilitates a framework for collaboration, content and visions of change outside the normal parameters of the established art world networks.

Launch at ISEA 2008

With the support of ISEA and Substation, n.e.w.s. will be spotlighted with a symposium/event in which members of n.e.w.s. and curators will attend in order to discuss and give feedback during this time. Contributing curators and n.e.w.s. representatives will talk about building the platform, the way content is determined through curatorial positionings, and further collaborative tactics.

Contributors: Ade Darmawan/Ruangrupa, Ingrid Commandeur, Thomas Berghuis, Inti Guerrero, Mia Jankowicz, Rich Streitmatter-Tran, Mustafa Maluka, Stephen Wright, Yuliya Sorokina, and Branka Ćurčić/Kuda.

Moderators: Lee Weng Choy/The Substation, Renée Ridgway/n.e.w.s.

Comments and user feedback welcome! Please add your events to our calendar or subscribe to our mailing for further projects and announcements.

For more information please contact admin@substation.org

n.e.w.s. foundation: Sannetje van Haarst, Renée Ridgway, Tiong Ang

n.e.w.s. is supported by the following institutions:
ISEA, The Substation, Mondriaan Foundation

Please click here to go to the n.e.w.s. website

Please clcik here to go to the ISEA 2008 website

AUGUST 2008

Magdalena (Singapore & Singapore Council of Women's Organisations (SCWO) Present :
Writing Your Story, Staging Your Story - workshop / Play Watching

Calling all aspiring writers, playwrights and theatre enthusiasts! Learn how to write for stage, create characters and settings, craft engaging dialogue, and get tips on how to get your work staged…

A 3-part programme in conjunction with Magdalena (Singapore)’s production of Blood Binds during August 2008:

Date: Sat 16 Aug 2008, 2–6pm (held at SCWO centre)

- Sun 24 Aug, 3 pm: Sperm / The Lunar Interviews

what they saw and the process of writing and staging plays.
Date: Sat 30 Aug 2008: 11am–1pm (held at SCWO centre)

This workshop is suitable for:

Take away: Participants will have written at least one scene by the end of the workshop.

Workshop Facilitators: Ng Swee San and Tan Suet Lee

FEES (for all 3 programmes including the play)

$70 per person for members & students

$80 per person for non-members

Minimum 20 participants

Maximum 40 participants

DATES

Bond-age & Just Late: Thu 21 Aug 8pm, Fri 22 Aug 8pm, Sat 23 Aug 3pm

Sperm & The Lunar Interviews: Sat 23 Aug 8pm, Sun 24 Aug 3pm & 8pm

VENUE

Drama Centre Black Box, 100 Victoria St, 5th fl, National Library

Workshop and Discussion to be held at SCWO Centre, Training Room 2

Registration deadline: 6 August 2008

July 2008

The Substation's Performance Lab Presents :
TEST TUBE

nelson chia

Performances & readings of works-in-progress by young artists.

Submissions are welcome from artists below 30 years of age, or with fewer than 5 years of professional practice. Are you working on a script or production? Working on a performance art piece? A monologue? A physical theatre piece? Or perhaps you've already staged a work and are thinking of re-working or re-staging it? This is a chance for you to test your work - particularly new or experimental work - and ideas before an audience.

The objective of Test Tube is to provide a developmental platform for young practitioners who are working independently and with limited resources. It's a space where they can meet like-minded young artists and receive peer-to-peer feedback as well as feedback from invited established artists. It's a space for them to reflect critically on their practice and work, and to aid their professional development. The emphasis is on developing the content of the artistic works. Test Tube will run a couple of times a year at The Substation, with each session showing a maximum of 4 works or readings.

Submissions are now invited for the first session of Test Tube on 5 July. Closing date for submissions is 2 June 2008. Works proposed should be no longer than 40 minutes.

There is no remuneration for the event. Participants are expected to cover the costs of their own props/materials and bring in their own stage crew and operators if needed. They can provide their own lighting designer/stage manager. Please keep your set-ups as simple as possible. Each group/artist will have a 4-hour set-up slot on 2 or 3 July. Final rehearsals are from 9 am - 5 pm on 5 July and the performance is on 5 July at 8 pm. A technical co-ordinator from The Substation will provide advice and supporting expertise, and The Substation's technical staff will rig the lights and be present in the theatre at all times.

Guidelines for submission:
- A proposal /concept paper no longer than 2 A4 pages, describing the work, your motivation, and biodata
- Full names, IC numbers, and dates of birth for all performers (for MDA arts licensing purposes)
- A list of your expected technical needs (eg. video projector, standing microphones)
- if you already have a script or a draft of a script, please send it in

Artists whose proposals are selected will be notified by 8 June 2008. Please send to our Artistic Co-Directors Audrey and Weng Choy via email: audrey@substation.org and wengchoy@mac.com

For more information please call The Substation on 6337 7535 during office hours.

JULY 2008

The Substation's Performance Lab Presents :
Workshops by Nelson Chia & Elizabeth de Roza

nelson chia

The Dramaturgy of an Actor
A workshop by Elizabeth de Roza
2 sessions: 19 and 26 July, 9 am - 12 noon
The Substation Dance Studio
Fees: $75. Student rates: $25 for students booking in groups of 2 or more persons
Maximum of 15 participants

"Exploring with the physical, intertwining and manifesting the layers of a character".This workshop will explore two streams of training, and look at developing a "physical score" of the actor. In both streams, the emphasis is on the actors’ craft and the techniques used in order to bring various characters alive on stage and to devise materials for a performance.

The first stream looks at a structured actors' training process. The focus is on the body and crafting different possible physical gestures and rhythms for characterization. This provides the participants with the techniques needed to devise materials for a performance and to create the nuances of a character. The next area of attention is to undertake an exploration of the body in motion.

The second stream of training explores an extended architecture of the body and spatial awareness, as a means of manifesting the "inner landscapes" of the actor and extending the actor's physical range.

The workshop is useful for actors and performers who want to extend their physical vocabulary and who are interested in devised theatre performance.

 

Approaches to Characterisation
A 3 hour workshop by Nelson Chia
30 July, 2 to 5pm
The Substation Dance Studio
Fees: $50. Student rates: $15 for students booking in groups of 2 or more persons
Maximum of 20 participants

So, you are being given a role in the play but what does it take to “characterize” it? Through exercises and discussions, the participants of this workshop will be introduced to ideas such as:

a) The background of a character and how it translates into performance
b) The physicality and speech pattern of a character
c) The base rhythm of a character
d) Character relationship

 

Directing a Scene
A 3 hour workshop by Nelson Chia
6 August, 2 to 5pm
The Substation Dance Studio
Fees: $50. Student rates: $15 for students booking in groups of 2 or more persons
Maximum of 20 participants

What are the things that a director actually does when he is said to be "directing a scene"?Participants of this workshop will be introduced to basic practical techniques that will let you put together a scene from page to stage.

To make a reservation, please contact our Box Office Manager, Chris, on 6337 7800 or email chris@substation.org

May 2008

The Substation's Performance Lab, Law Soo Leng & Richard Philip Present :
PRAY

pray 1

A movement theatre piece and a work-in-progress showing.

First performed in 2007, final version to be shown at The Substation's SeptFest 2008.

Children as young as 8 years old are told to perform oral sex and have sexual intercourse with men old enough to be their fathers. These pimps use simple childlike terms to teach the ideas of oral sex and intercourse to these children. “Boom boom” means intercourse; “yum yum” means oral sex. These and other horrendous real-life accounts were what the directors discovered when researching material for this movement theatre piece. Please visit this youtube site: http://youtube.com/watch?v=4SxNsSkkem8 and see for yourself (note from the editor: this is a confronting video that shows young children who are being “offered” in brothels) If this link does not work, just enter a search for: “child prostitution in Cambodia” and you will find a series of documentaries that will change the way you look at this world. According to a recent global estimate by the International Labour Organization, around 50 percent of the 1.39 million people involved in the forced sex trade are children.

Someone once said that we can tell how civilised a community is by the way it treats its children and its old folks. If we go by this rule, then looking at today’s world, where child prostitution is a burgeoning business and where thousands of children are forced into subjecting their bodies to the grossest form of commercial sex abuse, we must concede that our world is in an utterly depraved state. This crime against our children is a dark stain upon the fabric that we call human progress.

PRAY presents a group of people who use artistic expressions to gain and understanding of the contexts and situations that contribute to child prostitution. PRAY is a non-linear story made up of movements, images and sounds that will provide an artistic perspective to the deeply entrenched moral, sociological and cultural problem of child prostitution.

Directed by Law Soo Leng and Richard Philip

Music by Philip Tan and Richard Philip

Performed by Susan Yeung, Chermaine Soon, Kon Su Sam, Paulina Castillo, Esteban Chaparro, Ng Peiru, Ng Peiyi, Law Soo Leng and Richard Philip

Stage managed by Yap Seok Hui

Text by Richard Philip

Choreography by Law Soo Leng

APRIL 2008

The Substation, Raka Maitra & Jayanthi Siva Present :
GREY Festival 2008: A Celebration of Indian Contemporary Dance

grey festival

This is a four-day festival where local and international dance and theatre practitioners will present and share ideas in workshops, discussions, video screenings and nightly performances.
Features international guests, Navtej S. Johar, Ramli Ibrahim, Maya Rao and Madhu Nataraj, as well as many local artists. For more info on festival passes and discounts, please contact Jayanthi on 8172 6800 or jayanthi@hotmail.com or Raka on 9129 5110 or rakamaitra@hotmail.com. For enquiries on workshops, please contact Raka.

Thursday 24 April: 8pm: Performance: "Smoking Incense " - re-worked by Haymini Muthusamy (India) & "Sheer Fall" - Navtej S. Johar (India)

Friday 25 April: 8pm: Performance: "Traces" - Elizabeth De Roza, Lewis Jamie Marie & Khairiyah Bte Ramli (Singapore) & "Khol Do" - Maya K. Rao (India)

Saturday 26 April: 11am to 1pm: Workshop on Indian dance from Contemporary to Modernity.

Saturday 26 April: 2pm: Screening of "Nachni – The Dancing Women of Rural Bengal” which is about music and dance folk performers who have kept alive many of India’s traditional dance traditions, followed by a post screening talk by Dr Urmimala Sarkar Munsi (India)

Saturday 26 April: 8pm: Performance: "Habitat" - Meera Gurumurthy & a contemporary approach to Odissi by Ramli Ibrahim and his troupe (Malaysia)

Sunday 27 April: 11am: Workshop on the Element of Motion in Dance by Raka Maitra

Sunday 27 April: 11am: Two Workshops: Bharatnatyam and Movement by Navtej S Johar & Kathak as a Springboard for Choreography by Madhu Nataraj

Sunday 27 April: 3pm: Forum on Contemporary Asian Dance, Negotiating the Past, free admission

Sunday 27 April: 8pm: Performance: "Parallel" - Kiran Kumar, Archana Kumar and Neisha Sundram (India), "Yashodhara" - Madhu Nataraj (India) & "Vajra" - Madhu Nataraj (India)

 

About the artists:

 

 

October 2007

Buds Theatre Company presents:
Essential Framing

Buds Theatre Company presents two plays by budding NUS writers. This double bill promises to be a night of unforgettable bittersweet musings about the absurd confines of relationships. With a dynamic cast including award-winning actress Claire Devine, and popular actor Andy Tear, the entertainment intends to tickle the sides of sanity and take reality by the reins.