IONA KEWNEY (Scotland)



01|12|19

I said this before, and I’ll say it again, but I think Iona has been a real wonderful way in which to start our second block in Estonia. The whole practice of what she’s been working on with us is based around expanding our physical range, which is wholly necessary and needed. The lack of more creative work has been both a blessing and a curse in this regard – I’ve missed that aspect of the training, but having this week to focus on my ways of moving has been very beneficial in other manners.
There was a moment that came up following an improvisation one afternoon, around the idea of movement habits and styles, which expanded on a discovery I made working with Stacy Makishi. The question was raised about how when there’s such a focus on moving in ways that aren’t your own, it can cause a noticeable amount of anxiety as you’re trying so hard to avoid your defaults. Iona’s response was really encouraging: it’s totally fine to be moving in your own way as your default, because you’re good at it and it’s interesting, however, use it as a springboard to try other things before returning to your default. It’s okay to be building and developing your own unique vocabulary.
This is similar to what Stacy touched upon with her idea of your “greatest hits”, as in, the work that got you to where you are. Everyone loves a greatest hits album, but what’s also nice every so often is an expansion into new territories. Although I understood this concept when we spoke with Stacy, I think Iona’s very casual and blunt way of approaching it made it a bit easier to digest. Simply put, she encouraged us to enjoy and play within our own unique styles, but then every so often just to snap into something completely different, before returning.
Following this, I really tried to allow myself to feel comfortable and even joyful in moving the way I naturally do, but with a special attention to breaking out of it in particular moments. I can’t say how much this was effective for an outside viewer, but for me personally, I felt a huge sense of relief from the usual anxiety I have when trying to avoid my natural habits.

This is something I want to hold onto physically, but also creatively – especially right now with our solo process, I’m feeling that same anxiety about trying to make a work that is entirely different to what I might naturally be drawn to. I think this is hindering me though. I’m so crippled that I end up blocking my natural creative flow at the fear of making something that is just another ‘Marshall’ piece. I don’t know where this deep-seated aspiration to always be reinventing myself comes from (maybe it’s three years of drama school where you are often pushed to do things differently), but I am making a conscious effort to let it go.
Now that I have addressed this somewhat mentally, I’ve begun to feel a lot more enjoyment and interest towards this solo I am making. I think this is the place I need to be, and, like Iona said, I can use my natural instincts as a base that I leap away from every so often - and that’s fine. The way I move and create is why I’m here, why I’ve been successful so far, and why people are going to remember me. There’s no need to bury it. No-one sees a Hofesh show and says “man, I wish it wasn’t so Hofesh-y” – that’s why you bought the ticket. I, of course, want to build my diversity as a performer, but I don’t want to sanitise myself out of existence. The great Frances Barbe once said to me, “It’s about yourself building up, not tearing yourself down.”

On a much more practical level, Iona spoke a lot about hands, and their role in movement. She made a very good point, in that everyone understands hands. They are largely the primary way we interact with the world, and with others, and pretty much any way your move your hands will have some interpretation from a viewer. This is to say, that moving your legs may have the space to be more abstract, because we don’t communicate with them as much, and therefore don’t have as strong a vocabulary that can be observed. Hands, however, can likely be interpreted in some way no-matter what you do with them.
This awareness was brought to us so that we could begin to become more aware of what our hands and arms were doing in our movement, and how important they become for communicating. I often think I have a reliance on using my arms and hands in my work, but now I can at least be more aware of what I’m doing with them in any given moment.

Finally, Iona really made a huge emphasis on the importance of a warmup. I’m pretty sure she said at one point that she will warmup for 4 hours or so before a one-hour performance. Insane. She presented the notion that how you warm up is how you’re going to move in the work, and it’s therefore extremely important to be aware of how you conduct your warmups. Iona being Iona, she’s mad and fast and flexible as all hell, so her warmups reflect that. I’m not sure exactly how I want to shape my warmups, but maybe it’s a good idea to warmup in a way that I plan to move for each particular situation – do I want to focus on body isolation? Then let’s isolate in the warmup. Do I want to move slow and flow-y? Then let’s stretch and move slow and flow-y for a warmup. It seems obvious, but it’s also something I haven’t really thought about too much.

It also applies heavily to group culture – how you warmup a room of collaborators, how you bring them into the space – this is directly going to influence how you work. Worth noting for the culture of something like the CPPM, too. We need to build and take care of our culture, to serve us as well as we can.

 29|11|12

I planned to focus this blog entry on the more performative elements we’ve been working on with Iona: acrobatics, handstands, energy, focus etc.
However in one of our many side-tracked conversations in between exercises, Iona inadvertently dropped some real truth bombs about the realities of being an independent artist. Most surprising was her stories of waking up at 5am to haul potatoes and other vegetables at a fresh produce store, then going to rehearsals for several hours, followed by sleep and then a shift cycling around for the majority of the day as an ‘uber eats’ delivery courier. Meanwhile, she had just been invited to not only perform at the International Contemporary Dance Festival, but to be the opening performance.
It reminds me of a viral news article from a few years ago in Australia, where a well-known band were nominated for multiple Australian Record Industry Awards, on the same day that two of their members were applying for jobs at McDonalds to pay rent. It makes me think a lot about how I want to be operating as an artist.
Do I want to be independent, jumping from performance to performance, project to project, but with full control over my own artistic journey? Or do I want to pursue employment in a company, following someone else’s visions.


Iona had another story that dealt with this exact predicament. She had a friend who was working on a Sidi Larbi show, who left after the first week of rehearsals. This friend simply couldn’t align themselves with the style and form of Larbi’s shows, and despite the notoriety that this performance could bring – not to mention the money – he needed to leave as he wasn’t being creatively fulfilled. To me this is wild, as I’m obviously at a stage in my career where I would honestly take anything I could get in terms of paid employment (not literally anything, but close). Since the last few years has had such a focus on the development of my own craft and style, I’m actually feeling quite keen to jump onboard with another artist’s visions for a while. Iona did say one thing though, and it’s something I need to keep in mind: only say yes to opportunities you believe in.
It’s a fair point. As much as I need money and opportunity, if something isn’t going to fulfil me creatively or artistically, then what’s the point?



27|11|19


WE’RE BACK BABY.
And boy is my body paying the price of not exercising enough over the last 2 months. Especially considering Iona is a little Scottish superwoman with endless energy and drive to keep moving. I really envy that.
Something that is so unique to Iona’s movement is her ability for hyper-quick changes of direction in each individual body part – a seemingly random flurry of limbs and torso, were it not her ability to be so in control of each one. When I tried to emulate this movement on the first day, I failed because I was moving randomly, flinging each limb around. I then realised that it’s not random, it’s just quick thinking.
She has given hints here and there about how she achieves this quality, but really it comes down to an awareness of each body part and how each movement then leads to another. When she demonstrates these movements, there’s a flow of logic.
Hand goes down, chest follows, so knee bends, so knee rotates out, so body spins, so arms lift to bring body up into a pirouette and so on and so forth.

The second major factor in being able to achieve this quality is a connection with the Underworld as Iona calls it. If you don’t connect down, you lose your grounding and the dance ceases to be a dance, and it’s just you falling and balancing around the theatre. I’ve found it helpful to imagine a big iron ball hanging from a chain attached to my hips. This ball hangs down through the ground about 5 metres, and I feel its pull wherever I move. Theoretically. Still working on it.

I’ve also started to notice in these 2.5 days that I move the same body parts – Iona suggests listing down every body part you can individually move, so next time you might find yourself stuck rotating that left shoulder for the 31st time, you can go “ah, that’s right, I forgot my left ankle existed, let’s move that, which makes my hips go down, so my chest collapses etc.” and you have a whole new movement journey. Rinse and repeat.

Iona might be one of the best possible ways to recommence our training, because she really seems to be in the mindset of extending and reigniting our movement capacity. There’s so much juicy info we’re getting, but even more valuable is the intense and rewarding act of simply doing.