An integral part of all the KHOJ Residencies, outreach encompasses slide shows and presentations, artist's talks and an Open Studio Day where the artist's practice is open to viewing by the public. The following initiatives were organized in order to help the artists connect with each other, and get a sense of the various strands of Performance Art as it has taken shape in India.
A. Talks & Presentations
B. Workshops
C. Public Performances
D. Community Outreach
E. Open Studio
A. TALKS & PRESENTATIONS:
Each artist was invited to present significant works and discuss their practice with fellow artists-in-residence and before an audience of artists and students. This is vital to each artist gaining an insight into each other work and the direction it may take during the course of the residency.
Diane gave a two hour presentation at NSD comprising of a presentation on the development of her practice in New York, Europe and England over the last 25 years, a video of her 'Drag King Workshop' and concluding with a performance and a Q&A session.
A forum where artists are invited to share a significant artwork and or an aspect of their practice, followed by open discussion with the audience. In order to feed into and generate debate around the performance residency, the "NO ESCAPE" for March 2006, was centered on performance art. Three Delhi based artists working in Performance, (Shantanu Lodh and Mrs Manmeet & Inder Salim) showed videos of their works and received critique about their performances at the KHOJ Studios. NO ESCAPE generated a lively discussion over a variety of issues that are crucial concerns to the practice of Performance Art in India. Concept metaphors like nudity, morality, and derivation were passionately interrogated.
An informal discussion and visual presentations on Performance Art as manifested in South America and Europe, specifically Brazilian Avant-Garde performance, with a specific hope to debate and explore how such approaches to Performance may transform within the Indian scenario.
Nigah is a Delhi based group that works towards an articulation of diverse understandings of politics and social activism, and of issues around gender and sexuality. It has since evolved into an attempt to use different forms of media to initiate discussions around issues of gender and sexuality, replacing the silence around these issues with progressive and inclusive debate. http://www.geocities.com/nigahmedia/te.
B. WORKSHOPS
In a six-week international residency, it is important to introduce a system, which ensures that the artists coming from different backgrounds find a working chemistry, and get a feel of each other's practice. In the introductory meeting a consensus was generated that each of the participating artists would lead workshops at a pace the group felt comfortable with. The first three weeks witnessed one workshop each lead by: Diane Torr, Anusha Lall and Oreet Ashery. Beyond that point the workshops became redundant, having served their purpose as stipulators facilitating the initial exchange of ideas and personality clues.
Diane conducted three Drag King Workshop at NSD on Sunday Feb 11th, 18th and 25th for Foundation, First and Third Year students of NSD. The workshop was an intensive 10-12 hours where the participants enact and become 'Men for a Day'.
C. PUBLIC PERFORMANCES:
D. COMMUNITY OUTREACH
PASS ALONG: Diane Torr's workshop and performance with the children of the Khirkee. Diane Torr conducted several workshops with children and adults of the Khirkee community for PASS ALONG, one of the pieces she presented at the Open Day. Please visit http://KHOJcommunity.blogspot.com/ for more details and images.
excerpt from blog...
"Diane wanted to work with members of the Khirkee community towards her performance for the Open Studio Day. In order to garner some interest from the street and its residents, we put up a notice on the outside and waited for a response.
After an unsuccessful attempt at bringing the people of the street to participate in a dance workshop conducted by Diane, we invited the children of Khirkee to come on board. They, unlike the elders had no inhibitions, danced with no cares and always showed up before time for the rehearsals. The workshop revolved around movements that had been initially created by the adults and then further movements were generated by the children during the workshop and then improvised them into a performance.
There were 8 enthusiastic participants. Some who had been a part of the earlier workshops at KHOJ and some fresh faces. They had just finished with exams and had all the time in the world. There were times when they would show up at eleven in the morning when they were called at four in the evening.
This performance with the children was later presented on the open studio day as a part of Diane's performance work. The children were very excited with their costumes (satin ponchos and silver frills). On the 25th of March, the open studio day, there was an impressive audience, from the KHOJ guest list as well as from the community. The children performed outside KHOJ on the street. The crowd around them was so thick, that a number of us could not see their final display. The children did not have time to recover before they began dramatizing away in a street play workshop by Yatin Upadhaya. The workshop began on the 24th of March and will culminate on the 31st."