'Time Passages' At Melbourne Festival 2014: Extra Time

Photo: Suzie Fletcher

This post is an addendum to my earlier account of the live art project I carried out at Melbourne Festival Of Visual & Performing Arts recently.

Photo:  Suzie Fletcher

My own photos showed ‘Time Passages’, - the large piece I worked on there, in some detail, but were singularly devoid of human content.  The reality is, of course, that you can’t be producing artwork, interacting with the public and photographing yourself all at the same time.  Luckily, my friend Suzie found time to take some between her duties as Open Exhibition organiser, which I’ve included here.  It also means I’ve broken my general rule of not including my own ugly mug on this blog.  Trust me, it won’t happen very often.

Photos:  Suzie Fletcher

Of course, when the throng was thickest in The Assembly Rooms, Suzie was also fairly preoccupied, so you’ll just have to take my word for the fact that the room was actually pretty full at regular intervals throughout the weekend.  You get the idea…

Photos: Suzie Fletcher

I don’t need to say too much more about this project but I do want to take the opportunity to include a couple of passages of writing which seem to bookend it.  Indeed my initial reading (or re-reading) of them could be said to mark the starting point and the conclusion of it, in my mind.  The first is a piece, written by Suzie herself during a Poetry Workshop at nearby Calke Abbey, earlier this year [1.].  From what I’ve read, some very impressive work resulted from these and I definitely had in mind the varying emotional responses of the writers to that antiquated environment when I began planning ‘Time Passages’.  Suzie wrote several ‘Calke Love Poems’ during the workshop and this was the one I recalled most often, as I worked on it.

Bedroom At Calke Abbey.  Photo: National Trust/John Parkinson

  

Bypass

I lost my heart to this great house

Owing to misdemeanors past

And a delicate disposition last

It’s stowed away from prying eyes

‘place unknown’ categorised

I asked the gamekeeper,

Cook and chamber maid

Have you seen my heart?

Til’ they tired of my refrain

Have you checked your pockets?

Is it on your sleeve?

Have you checked your lists

And inventories?

I retraced my steps of

A hundred years

Looked for clues

The whys and wheres

This is absurd!

Said left brain to right brain

Take the logical approach

You must have stored it under ‘h’!

And then Doubt crept in

With her theories

It could be listed under

Organs, pumps or curiosities

What about mechanisms,

Components or specimens?

Oddities, miscellanea, cornucopia

Animal, vegetable, mineral

Or ‘Other’!

You’re not helping, Doubt

Asserts right brain

Tending towards drama queen

You’re both being ridiculous

This is all in vain

It’s plainly not filed anywhere

It’s lost in hell without a spare! 

A heated argument ensued

I retreated to a darkened room

And only when

I had lost hope too

It dawned on me

How deeply I love you

Nailed to the wall for all to see

I pass my heart every day

Unbeknownst to me [2.].

The 'Potting Shed' At Calke Abbey.  Photo: Phillip Sangwell

The second piece is the final passage of ‘Alices’s Adventures In Wonderland’.  As already described in my earlier post, that was the other suggested source that fed into my thinking about the project at the start; and it really triggered my ideas about subjective time in the final piece.  It was a pleasure to return to Carroll’s text again after some years, and to discover the rather lovely closing section.  It’s perhaps a little sentimental for some tastes, but I do find it rather moving.  It differs from the rest of the book’s fantastical tone in being a a more grown up reflection, from the perspective of Alice’s older sister, on the nature of dream time and the subjective memories of childhood that dwell deep within us all [3.].

Sir John Tenniel, Illustration From 'Alice's Adventures In Wonderland'

“‘Wake up, Alice dear!’ said her sister.  ‘Why, what a long sleep you’ve had!’

‘Oh, I’ve had such a curious dream!’ said Alice, and she told her sister, as well as she could remember them, all the strange Adventures of hers that you have just been reading about; and when she had finished, her sister kissed her, and said, ‘It was a curious dream, dear, certainly: but now run in to your tea; it’s getting late.’  So Alice got up and ran off, thinking while she ran, as well she might, what a wonderful dream it had been.”

“But her sister sat still just as she left her, leaning her head on her hand, watching the setting sun, and thinking of little Alice and all her wonderful Adventures, till she too began dreaming after a fashion, and this was her dream:

“First, she dreamed of little Alice herself, and once again the tiny hands were clasped upon her knee, and the bright, eager eyes were looking up into hers – she could hear the very tones of her voice, and see that queer little toss of her head to keep back the wandering hair that would always get into her eyes – and still as she listened, or seemed to listen, the whole place around her seemed alive with the strange creatures of her little sister’s dream.

“The long grass rustled at her feet as the White Rabbit hurried by – the frightened Mouse splashed his way through the neighbouring pool – she could hear the rattle of teacups as the March Hare and his friends shared their never-ending meal, and the shrill voice of the Queen ordering off her unfortunate guests to execution – once more the pig-baby was sneezing on the Duchess’s knee, while plates and dishes crashed around it – once more the shriek of the Gryphon, the squeaking of the Lizard’s slate-pencil, and the air, mixed up with the distant sobs of the miserable Mock Turtle.

“So she sat on, with closed eyes, and half believed herself in Wonderland, though she knew she had but to open them again, and all would change to dull reality – the grass would be only rustling in the wind, and the pool rippling to the waving of the reeds – the rattling teacups would change to tinkling sheep-bells, and the Queen’s shrill cries to the voice of the Shepherd boy – and the sneeze of the baby, the shriek of the Gryphon, and all the other queer noises, would change (she knew) to the confused clamour of the busy farm-yard – while the lowing of the cattle in the distance would take the place of the Mock Turtle’s heavy sobs.

“Lastly, she pictured to herself how this same little sister of hers would, in the after-time, be herself a grown woman; and how she would keep, through all her riper years, the simple and loving heart of childhood; and how she would gather about her other little children, and make their eyes bright and eager with many a strange tale, perhaps even with the dream of Wonderland of long ago: and how she would feel with all their simple sorrows, and find a pleasure in all their simple joys, remembering her own child-life and the happy summer days.” [4.]

Sir John Tenniel, Illustration To 'Alice's Adventures
In Wonderland'.

[1.]:  Part of the programme of such workshops run by 'Expressium Poetics'.

[2.]:  Suzie Fletcher, 'Bypass', From 'Calke Love Poems'  (A Series Of Pieces Written In Response To The Environment And Memories Of Calke Abbey, Derbyshire).

[3.]:  There has been much speculation about the exact nature of Carroll’s (in reality, Rev. Charles Dodgson), relationship with young Alice Liddell, on whom his heroine was modeled and for whom the book was penned.  I guess it’s hard not to be suspicious in these cynical, sex-obsessed times, but for now, I’m content to keep an open mind and hope that his real motive was to revel in the innocence and imagination of childhood, and nothing more sinister.  The truth is, of course, rarely black and white.

[4.]:  Lewis Carroll, ‘Alice’s Adventures In Wonderland’, London, Macmillan, 1865