exchange: performance book

ex•change

a performance in six acts: rearticulating a corporate, urban plaza through the crossing & engagement of six characters with this context [using play to add softness to a hard space.]

contents of the performance > university college london the bartlett school of architecture masters in architectural design 2009-2010 tutor, shaun murray

kim walker kimberlycwalker@gmail.com kimberlycwalker.tumblr.com flat sixteen anton studios 2-8 anton street e8 2ad london, united kingdom

the premise

1

the participants

9

act one

51

act two

61

act three

71

the in-betweens

81

act four

87

act five

97

act six

107

subsequently

123

the workbooks

129

filming agreement

133

this performance uses used human participation as a vehicle for exploring and being more conscious of: [1] how we relate to the spaces we inhabit, bridging the gap between thinking about and experiencing architecture; [2] the recriprocal relationship between form and action; [3] the visible and hidden factors within social space which shape a place; [4] the temporary reconstruction of a given landscape - making something new out of the ordinary, using a given space in a new way.

[5] using play - a group of people, props, and the given environment - to make something more by changing the way the space is seen.

[6] seeing a space from different viewpoints, depending on one’s behaviour and way of moving through or within it.

1

day: sunday, 4 july 2010 time: 12:00 - 15:00

the premise a site specific performance > to experience the change of a space through the way it is used by the people within it. this performance utilizes the exchange square in the financial district of the City in London to test this idea: it is a space full of white collar workers on the weekdays and empty of people on the weekend. it is turned into a hybid construction of these two through this particular performance, inserting people in the square to play with the space on a sunday and seeing what comes out of the set of instructions and roles given to the participants to perform.

background

broadgate estate the City, London

‘The increasing privatization of the ‘public’ realm raises questions about whether and how London’s public spaces can create the spontaneous possibilities of truly urban places and still continue to be spaces where you feel safe lost a crowd.’

Questioning the public and private of London: and in a in crowd.’

Questioning the public and private facesfaces of London: ‘if, ‘if, and how, how, London can leverage for public-realm projects London can leverage privateprivate fundingfunding for public-realm projects withoutwithout relinrelinquishing quishing control to private interests.’

[Ricky Burdett, ‘The Capital of Suburbia’]

The financial district in London, known as The City, is all hustle and bustle during the work week, business men and women, bankers, hurrying about to and from the office and meetings and lunches. The street level of the buildings are full of open shops and pubs and restaurants. But then on the weekend, when the bankers are at home, it feels almost as if one stepped into a ghost town: nobody is in the streets and most of the shops are closed.

Located just west of Liverpool St. Station in the City, the estate of Broadgate was developed as a highly innovative business district in the late 80‘s and early 90‘s. It is advertised on its website as: ‘The Capital of the City. Situated in the heart of the City of London’s Square Mile, Broadgate is much more than just a geographical area, it has become a dynamic, thriving business community where over 30,000 people work each day.’

And this statement is true in many ways. Except, if one walks through

exchange square

Broadgate on a Sunday, this ‘dynamic, thriving business community’ has disappeared and is nowhere to be seen.

In the design of Broadgate, the consideration of urban planning and architecture led to the creation of four well designed and connected plaza spaces for the city. Yet these seemingly public spaces are actually private, owned and controlled by a corporation with its own legal set of rules to be followed - one must be granted permission to take photographs or film anywhere in Broadgate.

A filming agreement and permit were obtained from Broadgate Estates in order to use the space for the performance, the resulting paperwork becoming an element of the project revealing an unseen but felt social boundary that is significant in forming the place.

This performance used the Exchange Square in Broadgate as a site of play and participation within this corporate environment, rearticulating the context through human interaction with it.

“there’s always the feeling in the City that its not being used as it was was designed designed to to be be used. used. the the only only time time i i ever ever see see the the City City isis when when it’s its totally empty and all the shops and even the restaurants are closed.”

James [the crowd] broadgate estate

2

ENTER

PERFORM

ENTER

ENTER

SIT

PLAY sit

sit

DRINK

LEAN

EAT

EAT

exchange square

LISTEN

EAT

ENTER

LOOK

sit sit

sit sit

EAT

19 may 2010, wednesday 13:00

EAT

WALK UNDER 16 may 2010, sunday 13:00

activity zones

3

16 may 2010, sunday 13:00

19 may 2010, wednesday 13:00

“I guess I prefer [the square] empty because it feels so bizarre, its not built to be empty, its built to be full. and when its empty it feels like you own it slightly... but i think its a shame, they’re great spaces, but really can be quite ugly as well in the corporate way. very one-dimensional, with everyone perching on this granite. its not very soft is it?”

Lucy [the child]

4

hidden boundaries:

public/private [a dialogue] date/ friday, 15 may time/ 14:22 location/ exchange square

me, standing in square with camera: takes a picture of the buildings. older man in neon yellow jacket with broadgate estate logo (security guard): walks towards me. him: ‘have you got permission?’ me: ‘huh. no. permission for what? to take photos?’ him: ‘yeah. you need permission. it’s a private estate here.’ me: ‘OH. okay. I won’t take any more then.’ me (in my head): what? really? this isn’t actually public space is it. suddenly it feels different, i feel uncomfortable in it, like i’m not supposed to be here. me, walking away: glances back at the security guard. security guard: walks in the opposite direction from me. me, with camera: covertly snaps a couple more photos and then quickly leaves the ‘public’ plaza.

5

16 may 2010, sunday 13:00

19 may 2010, wednesday 13:00

1 stairs/step

the six scenes of the perfromance performance

4 wall/lean

2 stage/jump

5 bench/sit

3 fence/stand

6 passage/walk

6

[sequence of acts] site plan, Exchange Square Set in a sequence as experienced moving through the plaza. Each act centers around the interaction of a physical form [noun] with a human action [verb].

7

4

5

6

3

2

1

director /// kim walker recorders /// patrick berning, handheld video duane mclemore, still video ollie palmer, photography en[act]ors, group a /// 1, kelly ordemann, paul johnstone, james kirk 2, juliette desorgues, lucy jones 3, A-louise mackie, B-zayne armstrong 4, mackenzie bryant nico5, nic rodriguez 5, nicolas 6, adam phillips

9

re[form]ers, group b /// 1 nat spink 2 gintare rudyte 3 guy woodhouse 4 rich hardy 5 johannes muntinga 6 anna long 7 chao han

the participants>

a group of people -some who knew each other, some who didn’t- came together on a specific day, in a specific place, each bringing a bit of themselves to the role they were given, and, as the Acts went on, their individuality came forth and the group became more inventive and more playful with the performance.

participant name:

“[the performance] says something about sociology as well as about architecture. its about the ability to feel comfortable in a group and take part in that group and to reconstruct space with other people who are within it... in a way that you didn’t know was possible before.“ Duane [still video] “it was amazing coming up to the group and everyone was in their black with the green fabric flying around and you kind of realize that it was a group of people doing this thing and a real performance, and a real change of activity within the space. it was quite shocking in a way, and really quite impressive. so you didn’t really feel that until you saw the other people doing it, you didn’t feel it so much when you saw it all on paper and it was hypothetical activities, you really need the people to make you believe in that kind of thing.” lucy [the child]

10

11

>>> dialogue w/ kim had you ever been to the exchange square before? yeah, i was looking for a site for this project, a site in the City in which it had this change of space between busy during the weekday and then empty on the weekend. i was looking around that area, at a couple other squares, and then i happened to just kind of come upon this one and it just felt right, its weird cause it almost feels really cool surrounded by these massive buildings and this train station and the water and tensile canopies - but actually it just feels really

around trying to also take pictures while i was telling people what to do and talk to all the characters. you can’t see it all, but i’m the only one that knows everyone’s roles and i know that overall point of view whereas everyone else is just doing their one role and following that specific script, you know, i had to see the whole thing.

how did your role change as we went through the acts? as we went through each of the six acts, at the beginning no one really knew what they were doing and i really

we moved and everyone else was just waiting for me to say when...

who did you interact with? i interacted with everyone. and you could see, certain people, like with the reformers, certain people knew each other and tended to work together, but they had to work together because usually two people were holding the fabric or they had to form the space in a line so they all had to communicate, and you know at the beginning i placed them a lot more, and then at the end i said, go on... and there was quite a few times, like

“i’m the only one that knew everyone’s roles and i knew that overall point of view whereas everyone else was just performing their one role and following that specific script, you know, i had to see the whole thing.” bizzare, its just so hard, you’re not really meant to use it, the grass is all fenced and manicured, the granite’s... really tough. even though it is a public apace, its so guarded, it feels like its only for the City suits, the workers in those buildings, not to share with the larger public. its kind of hidden too, right next to liverpool street station where people always go through but you don’t know its there.

what was your role? how did you enact it? what was your prop/how did you use it? well since i put together the project and i wrote the script of the different acts for it, i knew what i wanted people to do in it so i was directing the whole thing basically. and it felt like it went so fast cause i was just running

had to kind of place the reformers, the green fabric people, i had to move them around and place them and say stretch this, do that. but then as we went through they kind of took on, they knew what to do and then they tested it more. so in the beginning i really was directing a lot more and i took a lot fewer photographs, but then in the end i took much more photographs because i could stand to the side and watch people play with it. cause they had learned how to interact, they became more of this team. i was still directing, i was trying to keep it moving and saying, action or stop, there were two scenes in each act and we ran through each scene twice, the first one everyone went quite slow and then the second one i tended to say okay everyone speed it up, just to get another view of it. so i kept the rhythm, the movement going, and how

on the ledge, the forth act, you know i had written in the script that we would lay all the fabric over the wall and then the reformers would be back against the sculpture, but because of the wind you couldn’t let go of the fabric or it would go flying, so we changed that and they just did a different thing, they held it in a different way and let it fly. so we had to improvise, because not knowing there would be such a gusty wind there, it changed things.

what was your favorite location/act? why? what happened in it? in a way i liked the breaks, the inbetween parts, just as much as the acts, cause then people did their own thing, especially the break after the third act, you know you saw everyone using the fabric to wrap around themselves to play on the grass. we

were able to play in the space in a way that you’re not allowed to. people just said, you know, we don’t care that you’re not supposed to go on the grass, we are. and then climbing up on the sculpture, we became this group that, because we were together we weren’t worried what everyone else was thinking we were allowed to use it in a way that its not usually usable. i think just having the people and the fabric and the wind made so many other opportunities... its so corporate, but instead it was fun. and the props, i think what really made this work... its not necessarily the green fabric that’s important, its giving people something to play with that allows them to change the setting. if they didn’t have that material, they wouldn’t act the same way, but because they had this material they were able to emphasize different features of the plaza and the environment its set in, like those different activities that we were doing because of the fabric, how they hold it. and also it makes people really put their body into different shapes and forms, put their arms really up high, out stretched. so i think the green fabric as a prop was really important in getting people to have more fun, but then secondly the props for the characters were extremely important: to the crowd i gave these long sticks, as a crowd you’re quite loud and you don’t notice what’s around you, you’re just one thing that moves around, so they always started first and they were so loud, and they had quite a lot of fun hitting on different surfaces to make different sounds and hitting against each other, so that was great, without those sticks they wouldn’t have used their character to quite that degree i think.

were the two strangers passing. they always started on two opposite sides and passed in the middle, so they had two glass bottles which they clinked together everytime they passed, so that physical act of clinking made them have to look up and pause for a second, and so you not only had the sound that happened half way through each act that you could tune into, you knew it was always going to be coming, and they always looked at each other, but because of those props they, louise and zayne, began to make it into this faux romance story that these two people passing became to know each other a little more and a little more, and they in the end turned this clinking sound, which is all i had asked for, i just wanted the sound, they turned it into a cheersing on the bench, you know they turned it into these two people that have met and fallen in love, just this really ridiculous fun story. lucy and juliette were mother and child, i gave the mother the camera, so it was like you’re always taking a picture of your kid, you know, so they had to stop and use the space, sit down in it or look at it, frame it... and i gave the child the task of really touching, being very tactile, being able to do things that adults wouldn’t do, which is how kids, kids can get away with that. and they were lower to the ground, they see things differently, and they really feel things. so lucy in the end was very much aware of how hard the plaza was, cause she was down on the ground, she was sitting, she was all over the place, she was really feeling the fabric and playing with the fabric much more than all the other characters.

>>> cont.inued on p. 38

you know, one of my favorite characters

12

“i think that if you are able to get a group of people to have fun, then interesting things come out of that, and that was the whole point, was for me to construct a set of guidelines, a script, which told people how to move, how to act, but what comes through that is so much more interesting, seeing how people let it evolve.�

13

[kim walker] script writer, director, photographer

>>> dialogue w/ ollie had you ever been to the exchange square before?

I’ve passed through it once or twice. I really like the building on the north side which is suspended above the square. It would have been kind of late at night, I think walking back from the pub, not very note worthy experiences, just getting on dusk - it all gets a bit kind of dead around that area cause its quite, I would say financially based, its very much that kind of industry, yeah, completely dead.

It was different on the performance day cause I went there a different way than I came before, I pretty much followed directions to liverpool street station and went north from there, whereas every other time I’d gone west and kind of just crossed it by chance. I think it makes quite a different destination to somebody just passing through it on a route. you can see the route that I took on the quirky stop-frame video... So yeah, it was different that day, and also I hadn’t been there when it had been daytime and really sunny, so it was a different environment and people were kindof just hanging outthere were sort of asian families having bbqs there and...

what was your role? how did you enact it? what was your prop/how did you use it?

I took photographs of the whole thing and little videos- so I was kind of following people around. and there were a few times when I got people to do things again cause I didn’t get the right shot type of thing, I would say probably interfering in a very small kind of capacity, but the mostly I was observing, through a camera lens- its a different way of viewing cause when you’re taking

photos you’re kind of choosing what to see and what not to see, you’re choosing more what to cut out than what to include and you have to kind of see everything through a gridded point of view whereas if you’re just walking through the world its just a kind of big mess really, but as you’re walking around as a photographer you just see everything with squares and follow the rules set up for you.

how did your role change as we went through the acts?

I think there was a lot more fluidity towards the end, and particularly I think that was down both to being more comfortable with what was going on, cause the first act, we started once everyone had mostly turned up and we had all talked about what we were going to do but weren’t quite sure exactly how it was going to happen, weren’t quite sure exactly who was doing what, and then it all kicked off. and i think the first few takes we did in the first act were a bit messy but then it was to be expected, and by the end it felt a lot more fluid, i was able to go up a lot closer to people and be more intrusive and not feel like I was being intrusive. yeah, my role kind of changed during the day... and also I got more aware of how people would act around each other, the way that different people would move through the space, you know, whether they would be fast or slow or that kind of thing, so as I could see them coming I knew where to position myself to get the shot.

the ones I quite liked were the two with the glasses, where they were chinking glasses everytime because there was a definitive moment half way through in everything that was going on, where they’d come together and chink their glasses and you’d know then, this is half way over and that kind of changed each time. yeah, and so i talked to the guy, zayne, and he was saying he’s like a medium-fast guy, and we had this kind of running joke that he wasn’t moving mediumly enough, he was kind of too fast. [kim: that sounds like zayne. and do you know their faux romance that was happening?] on the day? not in reality... [kim: yeah, not in reality] yeah I could see that they were getting closer because as they moved to each other on the bench at the end... I think I didn’t get a shot of their chinks the first few times around and then always did towards the end of the day, which is a real kind of shame cause there was a lot more chemistry towards the end of

“i think it did shift the paradigm of performer and observer.”

[kim: can you talk a little more about specific characters and how they moved through the space...]

the day with them and they were a lot closer in what they were doing. the mother and daughter one I found really intriguing, it was only by the end of the day that I found out they were mother and daughter and suddenly I went, ah of course, that makes sense, I just thought one of them was being really bossy... the mother was a lot more controlling, always just trying to document what the kid was doing in a funny kind of way. there was one cameraman who was walking around all the time following somebody

“i talked to the guy, zayne [a stranger], and he was saying he’s a medium-fast guy, and we had this kind of running joke that he wasn’t moving mediumly enough, he was kind of too fast.” really closely - was he part of the performance or was he part of the documentation? [kim: well, he was a documenter, but when I was writing up the roles, I did think about the people documenting as a part of the performance because they are, they’re not, you know as a documenter your role changes with how everyone changes...] yeah there was quite a lot where he was so involved within what was going on, other characters had to step around him and avoid being in his path, but he wasn’t doing anything participatory, if that makes sense, he wasn’t doing anything that would change, besides actually just being in the way, he didn’t change the way they were acting, there was a strange dynamic going on with him. [kim: i know... he took it upon himself, I said i wanted some close ups, he decided to actually follow each of the characters so that it was more of a first person view, and just assigned a character to each scene that he would follow, so people only got followed once for that scene and I think it was kind of uncomfortable for them having the camera that close but in the end they cared less.] yeah, it went well. i think it did shift the paradigm of performer and observer and i think, no, probably i

was in the way a couple of times and i probably did exactly the same.

who did you interact with? i didn’t really interact directly with that many people, cause i was just an observer. there were a couple bits, like the chinking glasses and i followed the guys with the sticks and i got them to hold them up, but there wasn’t a massive amount of direct interaction during the performance itself and i really didn’t want to get in the way or adjust its outcome too much.

what was your favorite location/act? why? what happened in it? i think my favorite one was probably the final one, the wind was just fantastic in that tunnel. it really, it was blustering about everywhere, everybody was being quite dragged along by the fabric, almost as if the fabric was really playing a participatory role in the whole thing because it had a mind of its own, one minute it came this way and the next going that way, or running into the back of it... i think it was just a lot more loose and open. also the lighting falling on the green, coming from a photography point of view, it was a really well lit...

>>> cont.inued on p. 38

14

“mostly I was observing through a camera lens- its a different way of viewing cause when you’re taking photos you’re choosing what to see and what not to see, you’re choosing more what to cut out than what to include and you have to see everything through a gridded point of view whereas if you’re just walking through the world its just a big mess really, but if you’re walking around as a photographer you see everything with squares over laid and follow the rules set up for you.”

15

[ollie palmer] photography

>>> dialogue w/ duane had you ever been to the exchange square before? yes. I had been there in the middle of the day, weekday, and I had been there multiple times on the weekends, on my way to christ church spitalfields. I discovered it being lost one day, so that was the interesting bit, the first time I was there was a weekend day and I was lost, not lost, but I just wound up there, and I saw the arch of the structure of the broadgate building and the fact that it was open underneath and I thought, well I’ve gotta check that out, so I went and I saw this thing and I’m like, you’re kidding, this is incredible, and there’s no one here - that was on a sunday and I mean its just, massively full on a weekday, but on a weekend you know there were probably 35 people if that through while I was there, and you know its next to a very busy train station too, so its surprising.

what was your role? how did you enact it? what was your prop/how did you use it?

I was a camera-person. I was in charge of the two still cameras.

As the confidence grew and the takes got longer, it sort of became less possible to just hang out by one of the cameras during the shoot so I decided instead of just being somebody off script, running through the takes, that I would grab the green cloth and at least do something while I was there, at least look like I was supposed to be doing something.

I started carrying around the green fabric, towards the end when we were shooting more long takes, I was nervous about battery on one of the cameras so I was constantly running

back and forth in between them, so there was no avoiding being on camera and so I just decided to not just be a camera person but be a part of it too.

how did your role change as we went through the acts?

I’m a natural sort of attention whore, no I’m kidding, its true, but I’m kidding... everybody I think got into the act of feeling like they were a little more in front of camera by the

point, i guess I’d say. yeah, not anyone really, until that last take, that last take I was out there, I don’t know if I was interacting with anyone... maybe people were interacting with me... I couldn’t tell through a sheet of green cloth. yes, martini shot. that’s the last shot of the day in the movie industry, its one of those terms that even the people who aren’t into the movie industry

one of the ones on the steps, that was the most fun one i think. [kim: I found that the stuff in between the scenes and how people, on their own, decided to play with the green fabric was quite interesting. can you describe one situation where you saw people use the fabric....]

choreographed and documented and really original. its uh definitely a space that if i walk into it at noon on a sunday ever again, its going to feel completely different, it could be the same space, even be the same numbers of people doing the same low key things, but its just going to be... you know, that’s how memories are made.

well there was lunch break, where everyone was just, you’ve got tons

[kim: the other day we were talking a little bit about how it became this

of footage of people: one person getting in it as a hammock, and two other people swinging them around, or being dragged around the grass that we weren’t supposed to be on with the fabric - its part of the improvisation - we had a legit reason to be there so its not like they were hassling us or had reason to, but it was fun to see people take over that grass. take over that space and make it their own by the improbable act of swinging other people around in a piece of green fabric.

team building thing...]

“four hours of playing in the space, all rigorously recorded and choreographed and documented and really original. it’s definitely a space that, if i walk into it again, its going to feel completely different, it could be the same space, even be the same numbers of people doing the same things, but its just going to be... you know, that’s how memories are made.” end of it, everybody, the activity sort of loosened everybody up, and everybody could just go with it more. so rather than thinking that I was going to be ruining a take by running through to check on the other camera, I was just sort of like, eh I’ll just go with it.

I was definitely more an observer than the other participants, my role was easier in some ways in the sense that I didn’t have to anything choreographed, and I didn’t have to stand still with green fabric or anything like that, but it was tougher in some ways because I needed to let you [kim] direct and I needed to know that these would be two good takes that I could take from this angle, that were near where you put your camera symbol, tried to get it as close as possible but sometimes you know, sort of had to tweak it.

who did you interact with? no one really, it was mostly just whomever was closest to me at that

know, so basically, if you nail this one you get to go have a martini, so... the martini shot.

what was your favorite location/act? why? what happened in it?

I would say, I couldn’t really pick one, just because if there was something I liked about one, there might have been another where somebody else did something really funny or cool or neat. but in terms of the way that the building as a bridge really got the fabric really whipping around and made everybody’s green cloth go haywire, that was cool. there were a couple other takes where they got really good wind effects on the green fabric as well, that was really cool. so I mean... anything where the green fabric really came alive, that’s what was interesting to me, also there was the one where you had all the reconstructers hide like pebbles underneath the green fabric, that was

[kim: it was just an act of play in a space that is not about that.]

did you see the space differently after we finished? oh completely. no question. i mean you have the stories to tell, if nothing else, it’s like, you want to hear a funny thing about this space? if I’m walking by with people who weren’t there, I can tell them about it, four hours of playing in the space basically, all rigorously recorded and

as roles developed and as people began to make them their own, people also started to interact, have fun, with people they might not even have met before, and sort of you know, trust building is a bit of a cheesy term, trust is a cheesy term, but its true, and you develop a repoire with people, through play basically, and that’s it, what you did says something about sociology as well as about architecture and its about the ability to feel comfortable in a group and take part in that group and, you know, and to reconstruct space with other people who are within it... in a way that you didn’t know was possible before. so thanks... it was a lot of fun.

16

“I was a camera person, in charge of the two still cameras. As the confidence grew and the takes got longer, it became less possible to just hang out by one of the cameras during the shoot so, instead of just being somebody off script, I would grab the green cloth and do something while I was there.�

17

[duane mclemore] still video

>>> dialogue w/ patrick had you ever been to the exchange square before? yeah, with you. the first time that i was there it was with you [kim], and did we stumble upon it? i don’t know its the sort of place that you stumble upon... it feels very empty, very lifeless, doesn’t it. its a very constructed space, a very manufactured atmosphere in a sense, it wants to be a vibrant urban environment, but it turns out being just a corporate blank slate in a sense, you know. i mean its all kind of nicely manicured and well

what was your role? how did you enact it? what was your prop/how did you use it? my role was the hand held video camera, so i followed around various characters throughout their daily tasks so to speak. there’s six sets of characters and i followed each of them during one scene to see what we were acting out through their perspective. it was really interesting how it changed from the first set to the sixth cause there was a gradient of experience, you didn’t really know who to follow or what to do to begin with, everyone’s sort of floating around and doing their thing but wasn’t really comfortable with the whole situation.

“[the exchange square] feels very empty, very first group i followed lifeless, doesn’t it. it’s sowasthekelly and james and paul - the crowd - i followed them a very constructed space, at first not only because they number one on the a very manufactured listwerebutgroup because they were also to begin with, atmosphere in a sense, thetheymosthadactive the poles, they had the action, they had a really it wants to be a vibrant definitive path, and there was three of them, so they were easy urban environment, but to follow. it turns out being just a then i picked up on a different thread of each story... the corporate blank slate.” next one and the one i found constructed with nice materials, but its definitely void of any sort of spontaneity or any sort of texture i suppose. and that’s really apparent when you first go in, there’s no kind of, vibrancy that you get in a normal urban square.

really interesting was the zayne and louise thread, i guess what was interesting about them was they always had a cross to them, it wasn’t always just a direct path, it was a crossing of two different people. and i think what was really interesting to film, in terms of knowing the characters, is that whatever character you were following, you always could hear the clink in the back of you mind and you

always turned to watch that character, so this clink of these two characters was a constant through the whole thing. even though i followed different groups throughout the whole thing, i was always sort of attracted to this clink and this kind of cross movement of these two characters. and plus zayne and louise and quite interesting people to follow, they tended to imbue their role with a bit of pizazz. and this obviously gets to them writing their love story: you get two people like zayne and louise who are obviously really into this and suddenly decide that they’re two people in love so let’s write a love story on our paths that kim has given us, about how much we adore each other even though we’ve met like only fifteen minutes ago, but we’ve been given this role so we’re going to really live this role. it was two really good people who just kind of clicked and it made their scene really work, it made them really watchable in terms of their character. so they were one that i consistently followed. i think adam [the business man] was really interesting beccause he had a really definitive costume and a really definitive character. mackenzie [the lady] as well, adam and mackenzie on the green bench, i think they were quite good cause as separate characters you would have this crossing thing that louise and zayne had. and i think what’s funny is that zayne and louise didn’t know each other and but because they were two characters together they made this really interesting scene, and mackenzie and adam did know each other but were separate characters, but because they did know each other they had a non-verbal communication between the two, which was interesting, kind of like this non verbal communication you have when you’re in a crowd or amongst people, you tend to gravitate towards people you know, mackenzie and adam

tended to work together cause it was a kind of known. [kim: their roles given were these individuals that were separate from the rest of the group, and so i wonder if they hadn’t known each other they would have still gravitated together because they were given these roles that were apart from everyone else.] were they the only two alone? [kim: and then nic...] well, that’s an interesting point actually, i felt, i mean i felt really comfortable following right behind zayne and louise, right behind adam, mackenzie, james, paul, kelly - all these characters i felt really comfortable video taping right up next to their face and in their space... but nic, cause i don’t know nic very well i felt really strange, intrusive, going right up to him and filming what he was doing... so i kind of found other things that were happening, i was like, oh i’m going to film the moving chess piece, green fabric knocking over things, like lucy going nuts and juliette being ridiculous. they were also another really good one to follow, only cause lucy was great, and she just took it way beyond, i think people were kind of scared to stretch the boundaries in a sense, in my terms it was, well we need to make this work. and lucy took it and was, okay we’re going to make this work but its going to be, number one its going to fun and number two its going to be interesting, and that’s what made it really good to watch.

all kind of new at this thing - but they understand the whole role of being something else. [kim: i agree and i diagree, because i think everyone took on their characters so well, every single person... its interesting when i speak to all these characters afterwards, they really had the mind set of their character...] but you didn’t pull these roles out of a hat, you had an idea of the person you were giving these roles to. you know the people and i think consciously or subconsciously you assigned roles to people who you thought fit them... [mackenzie: i think that people did take on their roles naturally but at the same time that kim knew the people as well, i think it was a fusion of the two, i think that you were really good at assigning people, i mean i’m not an actress by any means but i felt really natural doing what i was doing. i think its a fusion of a lot of things, like your time here, your studying architecture... which is the whole point...] oh my god, p.s. this is architecture school right now, we’re in architecture school, we’re in school right now, this is what i was telling myself on sunday, we’re in school, this is school... [kim: this is my school...] oh my god school is awesome in london, i want to go to school here.

>>> cont.inued on p. 44

well i think it would have been really interesting, i mean if you were to do this again, to get real actors involved cause they understand - i mean we’re

18

“my role was filming with the hand held video camera, so i followed around various characters throughout their daily tasks, each of them during one scene to see what we were acting out through their perspective.“

19

[patrick berning] handheld video

20

the en[act]ors re-enact the ordinary everyday actions which have been observed taking place in the square during the weekdays.

The group is split into subgroups and specific actions and movements are assigned to each subgroup based on the human behaviour of the character type, responding to the physical form found in each scene.

21

group a re[form]ers en[act]ors

>>> dialogue w/ the crowd kelly: well that’s the thing, you know you walk against this crowd and people don’t even know that you’re there and you’re walking by them, you just are oblivious to other’s existence.

how did your role change as we went through the acts? kelly: i think we were less and less important or acknowledged. which is fair enough, cause we were making such a noise, but that’s what i thought - i don’t know what you guys felt... we were less and less necessarily a real part of anything, we were more and more on our own, which is probably more realistic. james: i got even more used to ignoring everything that was going on around me. and saying i have to stand here,

had you ever been to the exchange square before? kelly: no. james: i hadn’t. i wasn’t really aware that it was there. there’s always the feeling in the city that its not being used as it was designed to be used, i guess. cause the only time i ever see the city is when its totally empty and all the shops are closed even the restaurants are closed... paul: i have. just exploring, cycling through there, i lived close ... kelly: yeah you walk through on a weekend and you can’t even find lunch cause everything’s shut. i was at liverpool street the friday before, and i was all, oh i should see if i can see it and i was walking down the platform and there it was in front

of my face but i had no idea that it was there, i was even aware that you said you could lean over and see the tracks, but i didn’t know where... i didn’t know i should look up while i was walking to the train.

what was your role? how did you enact it? what was your prop/how did you use it?

behind or somebody said let’s move and nobody else did (that was me)... paul: but we were quite good at being oblivious. oblivious to other people..

james: and our role was to make noise like a crowd.

kelly: i mean i hardly knew what anyone else was doing to be honest, we were making so much noise that it was hard to be aware of anyone else - focusing on where to hit my stick next.

james: yeah i think we were quite introspective as a group, although we weren’t quite as cohesive as perhaps we should have been. our part said we were to move as one... people got left

james: and we were spinning kelly in the stretchy fabric paul: levitating kelly kelly: that was fun.

who did you interact with? kelly: we interacted with the fabric in the scenes where it sort of went over our heads and or it was surrounding us. we did interact with it with our

‘we were quite good at being oblivious. oblivious to other people... we were making so much noise that it was hard to be aware of anyone else - we were focusing on where to hit my stick next... which is quite appropriate for that city type crowd area, where people are doing their thing and the crowd passes and is insensitive to the individual.’

kelly: we were the crowd, we had sticks.

kelly: yeah just be noisy like a crowd, basically not caring what other people were doing around you...

be on the grass... but then we got on the grass anyways. and we were playing with the fabric and they were swinging me around in the fabric and i looked up and the statue had a fabric draped around her, and i was like, oh i’m going to do that to me, and then james took a picture, i didn’t take my clothes off completely like the statue... it was a mock interpretation.

paul: which is quite appropriate for that city type crowd kind of area, you know where people are just doing their thing and the crowd passes and they’re being insensitive to other people.

i have to walk around this point on this route and at this point do this, and absolutely ignore what everyone else did. and then i found i was doing that even outside of the scenes - just chatting and making noise with my little crowd. james: paul was on the statue, that was pretty good... he managed to drape the fabric on the sculpture’s face. i did think the best thing was kelly recreating the statue on her bit of fabric. kelly: cause we were on the grass, and i didn’t think we were allowed to

sticks, mostly. james: i did a fashion show with nat. and i think that had a effect on the other people who were using the space, i know there’s some pictures of me with the tourists behind looking at me... kelly: like you’re nuts. that would be correct. james: so i think the fabric draped around me and nat had quite an effect.

>>> cont.inued on p. 48

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1

the crowd (as a collective)

‘

speed: varies, fast-slow prop: sticks action: use sticks to make noise by hitting against objects and each other’s sticks, hold up in the air

The crowd is one, as one it negotiates and manipulates its spatial setting.

It cannot be hurried, it moves of its own accord at its own pace, but it can be prompted and encouraged to do as one outside the crowd wishes. The crowd mingles, mixes, blends, weaves and merges; in one moment it is still and close together and in the next it opens up and moves again. Within the crowd there are heads and there are feet: heads of varying heights always scanning what’s around them, and feet, as footsteps upon the ground, standing, swaying, walking, perceiving the surface beneath them.

’

[kelly ordemann, paul johnstone, james kirk] enactors, character one

23

>>> dialogue w/ lucy who did you interact with? i interacted a little bit with louise, i think that was a slightly an anarchic interaction- i accused her of trying to steal me into childhood slavery...

had you ever been to the exchange square before? no, i hadn’t been there before. but i had spent quite a lot of time in that area, the City, so i’m familiar with that kind of space. I guess I prefer it empty because it feels so bizarre, because its not built to be empty, its built to be full. and when its empty it kind of feels like you own it slightly. lunchtimes are interesting with everyone eating, especially in the summer, and mornings with everyone rushing around. but i think its a shame, they’re great spaces, but really can be quite ugly as well in the corporate way. very one-dimensional, with everyone perching on this granite. its not very soft is it?

what was your role? how did you enact it? what was your prop/how did you use it?

I was initially a mother, and then I was the little boy. I felt maybe more comfortable taking a more active role, a more physical role, and I enjoyed that I guess, maybe the subtleties of the mother role wasn’t really something i could get to grips with.

I was working with Juliette who was the mother, the son initially, before we switched. We had the camera so there was stopping and taking a photograph, we tried to do that once each time, but mainly I forgot about that and got really excited about fabric, which, I like to think was more about getting into role. and it was fun, I definitely had the fun tactile role. and i guess maybe i felt because I was the only person who was allowed within their role to act quite, not rebellious, but almost against accepted norms and accepted conditions, i guess maybe

because knowing that was only me I could exploit that to its fullest. i don’t know. kids can go crazy, and i like that, so i did.

how did your role change as we went through the acts? after the first act we switched roles. i guess i felt like i enjoyed each scene for what it was really, finding what was interesting in the scene and going with that, whether it was leaning over the platforms, in the second and third act there was a lot of high level fabric that was about jumping. i feel like each scene had a relationship between the fabric and the people and the space that a kid could really enjoy. so it was just different, progressing in a linear thing. i guess by the end of it i was really quite tired, ready for my afternoon childish nap. i guess that was what was going to happen next... it kind of has to.

i think my interactions were kindof playful and more about releasing tension and the unfamiliarity with what we were doing, so staying in role but teasing each other within role. which was quite fun. i find it funny that the stranger, zayne, ended up around the corner in the first act as did myself and juliette, so it was like, mommy’s taken me around the corner with a strange man basically, which was kind of about the characters but us outside of them as well. so i guess i found that the most interesting interaction, because as a kid you wouldn’t interact with anyone apart from your mother who’s kind of chaperoning you, supervising you, making you do things. i guess we could have had a more physical relationship, my mother figure could have stopped me throwing things maybe, would have added another dimension...

what was your favorite location/act? why? what happened in it? that’s difficult. i really liked the first act when i got to crawl through the human bodies, that was really fun, but i guess cause maybe that’s the first thing i did and it was new and shocking kindof. and i liked the last one, where you could lean against the fabric and it was kind of an obstacle with the wind pushing so hard that you had to lean against and actually be moved by the fabric. and everyone was doing that as well. yeah, they all had their own things though i think.

when/where did you find that you deviated from the instructions? what did you do then? i don’t think so! (laughter) i think i stuck to my instructions. um yeah... i touched the city god dammit, i touched that city. yeah, i don’t know that we zig zagged very much. i tended to just run away, as a five year old boy would, i don’t think i was, as you say, deviating from my character, i guess that was the point of child, to run away and touch and do things that you wouldn’t do as an adult. yeah i did end up in the wrong place quite a lot... as would a child... see, following the instructions. but, yeah, it was fun.

did you see the space differently after we finished? i think so, i think i found it - i think i talk about it a little bit in the handbook - its such a hard space, and i was constantly scared, especially moving in a sort of erratic way that i wouldn’t normally move in, constantly scared that i was going to fall over on these really shiny hard surfaces and how painful that would be if i were to fall over. and how hard that kind of architecture is, and how the people and the fabric that you introduced in the end are these sort of soft things, there’s nothing soft about that architecture at all except this perfect grass with a fence around it and this beautiful water -that i got to go in to save the blown away fabric- apart from that, the softness is just so contained and i don’t know why, i mean i don’t get it. it’s just crazy. and they have all that money to make it beautiful and who cares about your corporate whores they don’t get paid enough, they should go abroad, i find it really bored. and that contrasted so heavily with what we were doing... maybe they got some ideas, who knows.

24

2 “I definitely had the fun tactile role. and i guess because I was the only person who was allowed within their role to act quite, not rebellious, but almost against accepted norms and accepted conditions, knowing that was only me, I could exploit that to its fullest. kids can go crazy, and i like that, so i did.” lucy [child] mother & child

speed: slow-medium prop: camera action: move apart, touch a surface, move back together

‘

The small child, eyes wide taking in the excitement of the plaza, sneaks his hand from his mother’s grasp, running, stumbling away from her and finding the brick wall, placing his hands on the wall to steady himself. The mother, watches, then as instinctual habit, as protector, follows after, gathering her child’s small hand back into her larger one.

25

’

[juliette desorgues, lucy jones] enactors, character two

>>> dialogue w/ zayne

interact anyway. yeah yeah yeah. and so out of that came that louise and i were in this kind of... i didn’t know her very much at all before and so i ended up feeling like oh we don’t really know each other how are we going to do this? cause we kind of are being quite, i felt like i was thinking about her a lot and so it came from that this idea of being romantically involved with someone came up. which was really kind of bizarre and i really wasn’t expecting it but, we were just flirting a lot and our “relationship” ended up taking this really particular course that felt, inappropriate, as relationships do i guess. oh yeah it was really good. i want to see what her notes are. [kim: one of them was aesterix, fact: zayne keeps his workbook down his pants.]

had you ever been to the exchange square before? i must have been, i think i’ve walked down on the stairs, but its not a space that i’ve spent a lot of time in, and i haven’t thought of it as a specific square before, think i’ve walked through... once. i kind of always get lost around there... yeah it was on a weekday, you know those arches that look onto the trains and right next to that i think there’s a narrow walkway and i think its got steps that go down, i think i walked up where we played the first scenes, then down through those stairs. and it was really busy, i remember thinking oh yeah a lot of people must be going to the train station to go out of town for the weekend there was a lot of foot traffic. i really remember just that corridor space.

what was your role? how did you enact it? what was your prop/how did you use it? my role was two strangers... it was to be one of the two people who were strangers and pass each other along the trajectories which you had outlined for us. louise was the other one and we had bottles of fizzy apple juice which were green and clear and we would make a point of hitting as we passed each other. oh yeah, but that kind of turned into something else with louise and i, it was really fun because it felt like there was a lot of preparation time, yeah yeah yeah of course, and we weren’t in the same place ever, so the times when we were interacting, louise and i, i felt like i had to think a lot about what i was going to be doing before, i had to really focus and prepare myself because i

had to coordinate with someone else essentially. which is really funny because its exactly not what happens with strangers passing. but also, within that i stared to pay attention to taking notes while i was doing it, i was trying to be really considerate i guess of how i was preparing for things and i like what i was thinking about, i mean essentially trying to do the thing that you were setting out for us to do. and to spend time in these spaces doing things as this character while thinking about how i was using the space.

hahaha. oh yeah, that’s funny. i did. that’s true. good call. what a fact.

how did your role change as we went through the acts? as you developed your story, can you go through the acts? i did think about things like that from the get go, because louise and i were like, oh yeah we’re going to be the two strangers and we sat down and talked about it, i think that maybe that’s just the way that louise and i would

walking down the stairs it felt like very cinematic i think... and louise was being really kind of sexy about everything and she was wearing this dress and, aesthetically it reminds me of cinematic romance... this ‘we’re passing strangers thing,’ it felt very serious. so yeah that’s the passing each other on the stairs thing. and then after that... okay now what’s happened is that we’ve been really romantic in this way, and now the jumping thing. and i felt very disconnected from her, and it was sort of sad and we didn’t spend any time with each other. and jumping, it was sort of a silly thing to be doing and i was thinking about other things. and then we did the thing where we looked over the edge of the train tracks. and i started really taking notes seriously and everything felt really sexual all of a sudden... oh and louise said this thing when we were up at the edge, ‘ooo so romantic.’ and i was like, oh yeah that’s what’s going on this is really romantic. and then i think in my character i was feeling really jealous of her and protective which is really weird, i don’t know how that happened.

>>> cont.inued on p. 48

“i didn’t know her very much before and i felt like oh how are we going to do this? but i was thinking about her a lot and so this idea of being romantically involved came up. which was really kind of bizarre and i really wasn’t expecting it but, we were just flirting a lot and our “relationship” ended up taking this really particular course.” zayne [a stranger]

26

3A 3B

two strangers (pass)

speed: medium-fast prop: bell action: start in opposite positions, follow the path towards each other, as you cross, ring the bell

‘

In opposing directions they advance in the square, she drifting towards him, he sliding towards her. Eyes looking straight ahead, they pass with a slight swish, conscious of but paying no attention to the other, continuing on, through the space that the other one just came from, sounds of footsteps trailing behind.

27

’

[A-louise mackie, B-zayne armstrong] enactors, character three

>>> dialogue w/ mackenzie had this role that was specifically outside a lot of the group... that’s interesting...] yeah exactly, i think mine was totally consistent throughout the whole thing, it was really easy, natural.

who did you interact with? yeah i didn’t really interact with anyone, at least within the acts. [kim: not necessarily within the acts. i’ve found, that its almost the inbetween acts are just as interesting as the acts themselves.]

had you ever been to the exchange square before? no, it was my first time. it was really weird because i hadn’t been there before, that i never knew it existed, it was all of a sudden this whole new world.

what was your role? how did you enact it? what was your prop/how did you use it?

I was a lady. I got to wear a cute little pink ballerina skirt, that kim provided for me. and my character was meant to be kinda floaty and wandery. I had a magazine, and it was appropriate that it was a

fashion magazine from australia - i really liked it. I think it helped me to be removed from it, it was this thing that i could concentrate on, you know, and it was, for me, really natural, because it reminded me of being on the tube everyday. it reminded me of picking up the stupid newspapers that you pick up everyday, or that I do, because I’m like well, I could have a book on the tube or i could just pick up this ridiculous thing that is there so i don’t have to engage with people, which to be honest, i do. actually i didn’t really think about that before now, it really kind of reminded me of that, it was just something that i

its funny, i think i knew everyone there previously. so it was kind of just any other social event in a way, except that it was a bit more staged. i feel like i was with adam a lot, inadvertently or advertently, i mean i think our roles ended up being by each other and i think that in our group as well there were a couple sets of two and adam and i were singles and so then we kind of ended up being another set of two in a way, which is funny.

could have and read and not focus on the million people that are around me, and not even engage with them.

how did your role change as we went through the acts? um, no, not really at all. i was fairly consistent. and i emailed you, i was, you know, i think this role really suited me, which probably was on purpose but it was just really nice cause i didn’t have to act in any way i was just wandering and doing my thing.

yeah i think some people were more actively acting, i think that louise and zayne probably acted quite well together. i didn’t really notice the fabric people that much, i think i was really in my own little world to be honest, i noticed the people that were in my same role that took on characters, but then the fabric people, i was fairly removed from them.

[kim: the group as a whole tended to get more comfortable, and act more together as we went on, but since you

what was your favorite location/act? why? what happened in it?

“I had a magazine, I think it helped me to be removed from what was going on, it was this thing that i could concentrate on, really natural. it reminded me of being on the tube, of picking up the stupid newspapers that you pick up everyday... so i don’t have to engage with people.”

i think that the wind tunnel was my favorite, to be honest it was probably the most uncomfortable cause it was really cold, but it was really cool, it was just a lot of really nice effects and the whole setting of

it was quite cool, and maybe it was because it was towards the end and, everybody do what you kind of want to do, which didn’t change anything per se, but the contrast of it having been a really nice sunny day, and then being in there - it just felt like a completely different set to me, like it was a whole different world. its quite bizarre actually. and the thing is it literally felt different, the way the wind funnels through there.

when/where did you find that you deviated from the instructions? what did you do then? yeah i think i was a really good instruction follower, i think i followed the little dotted lines the entire way. i followed your lead, i was like, come on guys, this is what the dotted lines tell you to do...

did you see the space differently after we finished? oh totally. totally. i’m actually really intrigued to go back during the middle of the week just to see what its like, because i know it’d be completely different. its funny because i do think of this, like even now because its only what wednesday and that happened on sunday, and right now i even think of it as if a dream in a way - like i know it happened, but it was all a bit surreal anyways because it was this place i’d never been to in the middle of the city that was very stark, yet, i don’t know... it was really, kind of surreal in a way. so yeah, i would love to go back during the middle of it all. yeah, i loved it. i thought it was amazing.

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4

a lady (as if in a dream)

‘

speed: slow prop: magazine action: read the magazine, glance around, move forward, repeat

She glides as if in a dream. Elegantly winding her way through the mingling forms of people and objects, eyes skipping around, her skirt sways in that ballerina-esque way. It is as if she is both a part of the backdrop of the buildings all around, and as if she is completely alone and it is only her in this great urban space.

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’

[mackenzie bryant] enactors, character four

>>> dialogue w/ nicolas

had you ever been to the exchange square before? no. no actually, yeah, yeah, walked through it, kind of i’d say about ten months ago, last summer. during the week, i was just kind of hanging out, before i found a job, before when i had nothing to do, so i was just kind of walking around. a friend of mine told me that there was that sculpture there of botero so i just went to check it out, so i went, and saw it, and left, didn’t really stay long or anything.

what was your role? how did you enact it? what was your prop/how did you use it? i was the guard. i had the vest, that was my prop, and i just wore it basically. that was the way i used my prop, i wore it. i suppose i just walked around,

[kim: did you feel like you responded to the green fabric at all? did you even notice it...]

“the guard, or the idea i have and the way i acted the role, was like he’s kinda there, and people are aware that they’re there and behind this vest, but not really as a part of the action - as a walking prop i suppose.” surveying, checking people, what they were doing, somehow, guards always seem to be sort of suspicious of anything that anybody might be doing or looking at other people, and, figure out what they’re up to, any shinanigans or not. that was basically the way i did it.

how did your role change as we went through the acts? i think my attitude towards the role changed but i don’t think the role itself changed. because i didn’t really have any interaction with anybody, i wasn’t supposed to, so i was just

kind of in the background. i felt more comfortable with it, definitely, as time went by. [kim: the group as a whole got more comfortable...] yeah, yeah. but in the end that is felt because each individual went through the same as i did, like in the last one. in the beginning... i was a bit late, so i didn’t know what to do when i started, everybody seemed to know what they were doing already...

in some scenes, definitely, in some others, it was like it might as well not be there. definitely the last one, definitely the fabric was there... and the [stage] as well, you know it was kind of obvious and i had to jump or stand in front of them and get on the fabric, and the [fence] it was kind of draped just against the railings, and the [fifth one] it was more about the chess pieces than the fabric, do you know, and then the last one definitely the fabric... yeah, in that sense it was the only one in which i really interacted with not really other people, but with the fabric, walking through the fabric, do you know what i mean, and under it. and adam’s idea about the way the wind moved it back and everyone was kind of pushing it forward.

who did you interact with? did you interact with anyone? not really, not really. i think probably, i probably should have, maybe, i suppose... yeah no didn’t.

yeah. and i don’t know everyone seemed to be more... yeah i liked that. [kim: did you pick up the chess pieces at all...] no, no i just had to survey... [kim: although, they were using it in the wrong way...?] were they? yeah, that’s what i mean, that part i should have come and kicked their asses or something. but i was kind of, i was a hungover guard, it was difficult... [kim: well all the other characters, most of them, had people with them, you know, two people or three people, so they were interacting with each other, and its interesting having talked to most of them, they don’t remember what was going on around them, they are mostly connected with their group. and then mackenzie and adam, who were both single roles, they kind of ended up coming together to make a group almost, but then you were really solo.] yeah, that’s me... oh, interesting.

i suppose the guard, or the idea i have of it and the way i sort of acted the role, was like he’s kinda there, and people are aware that they’re there and behind this vest, but not really as a part of the action - as a walking prop i suppose.

when/where did you find that you deviated from the instructions? what did you do then?

what was your favorite location/act? why? what happened in it?

did you see the space differently after we finished?

that would be definitely the last one. but yeah, that one because i interacted with the people and the fabric. but i think that not as a part of it, but as third person for instance, i would think that the one i like the most is the one with the chess pieces,

no, no i didn’t, well sometimes i might not have followed the exact route or whatever, but no i did, i think so... except for being late...

i suppose. i haven’t been back, i don’t know if i will be, but yeah, definitely, if nothing else it would just remind me of that and it’ll definitely change, do you know, it has a different memory now, a very specific one, so yeah, definitely. yeah, it has too.

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5

keeper of the gate (guard)

speed: slow prop: yellow vest action: move forward, stop, survey the scene, move forward

‘

He is on a loop through the property, zig zag, enforcing the written word on the signs. They say: please keep off the grass. please keep out of the water.

He pauses to ask: ‘do you have permission?’

He says: ‘this is private property. no filming or photography allowed.’

He moves on, stopping to survey the scene in front of him and continuing to do his job, upholding the rules of the development and stipulating the public’s use of this urban space.

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’

[nicolas rodriguez] enactors, character five

>>> dialogue w/ adam

had you ever been to the exchange square before? not exactly in the square, I had bypassed it before, but I wouldn’t have known it was there. I thought it was nice, you had a nice bird’s eye, overhead view into Liverpool Street tracks, a nice plaza, where the actual exchange place is, but I thought, as for the actual plaza, the water feature and stuff, I really didn’t care for it, but in terms of an urban space and the urban form around it, you know it was definitely interesting, mostly cause of the train tracks.

what was your role? how did you enact it? what was your prop/how did you use it?

I was the businessman, just like any other. My prop was a mobile phone, so basically I was someone who’s kind of in their own world moving through space, but connected to

“I think the fabric helped see [the space] in a different way.“ their own world even though they exist in time moving through a public space but they’re really not engaging in it because of this device which you know takes them into their own world, doing their own thing.

how did your role change as we went through the acts?

I think the role did change the act we were to play with the chess pieces.

I think it was asking this man to be engaged with the objects in the space that was part of his path, whereas you know the other acts he was just kind of on mute with the other characters that were there. but the that act where we played with the chess pieces you know he kind of comes out of his own bubble - which is his relationship with his phone - and he actually engages with the pieces and the other characters

then kind of goes back into it when he leaves the chess set.

who did you interact with?

I was acting some with Mackenzie, when she was sitting on the bench I decided to join her and then the one other girl [lucy, the child] who sat down in the chess game, I decided to pile all the chess pieces on her, because I thought it was kind of, you know the business man was just passing by and sees these things and decides to pile it on all one person, I thought that that was perhaps kind of symbolic of this managerial person who just kind of piles all the work on somebody...

what was your favorite location/act? why? what happened in it?

did you see the space differently after we finished?

I think the best set, perhaps, was under the exchange house, the entry of the plaza, where the fabric was set up, because of the air vacuum, the wind tunnel that was created because of how the buildings were situated and the fabric was extenuating the wind tunnel and also the characters moving through the wind tunnel they’re interacting with the fabric by pushing it and getting their silhouette, I thought was perhaps the more interesting sets because it talks to me more about the atmospheres and conditions and people as objects and the material of the fabric, you know they react to that condition. and then they create a set of situations based on the placement of the characters and the objects within that condition. you know a series of situations occur such as interacting with the fabric.

yeah, because having been there for the first time really engaging in the public space I probably would see it differently had I not been there for that amount of time playing a character and envisioning and seeing the fabric, I think the fabric helped see it in a different way. I’d probably be much more analytical about it than I would otherwise typically be the first time.

when/where did you find that you deviated from the instructions? what did you do then?

Yeah I guess I did that... well I kind of followed the path, but I guess looking into the rail tracks is the one I kind of didn’t follow the exact directions, but my position was in the sun and I wanted to be in the shade.

“I think my role changed with the chess pieces, it was asking this man to be engaged with the objects in the space that was part of his path, whereas the other acts he was just kind of on mute with the other characters that were there. but with the chess pieces he kind of comes out of his own bubble - which is his relationship with his phone - and he actually engages with the pieces and the other characters then kind of goes back into it when he leaves the chess set.”

32

6

one man in a suit (like the rest)

‘

speed: fast prop: mobile action: speak on mobile, text on mobile, take long strides

The suit is the man or the man is the suit. In this context it defines him.

He is always going places, heading somewhere to take care of something. He sees what is in front of him, what he is moving towards. He moves through the space as though he knows it, as though he moves through it everyday, as habit, as second nature, it is his world, his domain.

33

’

[adam phillips] enactors, character six

34

“with the reformers, certain people knew each other and tended to stick closer, but they all had to work together because usually two people were holding the fabric or they had to form the space in as a group so they all had to communicate, and you know at the beginning i placed them a lot more, and then at the end i said, go on...“ kim [director] the reformers become elements in the environment that are no longer inamimate - they play a role as modulators of activity and are still, as juxtaposed with the moving participants from group A. they rearticulate the space around them within which group A performs their actions. they use large sheets of chartreuse stretchy fabric in combination with their bodies to reform the space, enclosing and redefining boundaries through various planes and forms. in each act: scene 1, fabric is stretched scene 2, fabric is draped

35

group b a re[form]ers

>>> dialogue w/ guy had you ever been to the exchange square before? yes, i’d been to the exchange square before, i used to have a friend who worked in one of the towers, in the corporate world - she was a lawyer. she worked for one of the big companies in one of the big towers... yeah i went down there around lunch and after work. it was quite busy, lots of suits, quite enjoyable i guess, lots going on, but very much a transitional space, but i guess at lunch time people sit eating instead of rushing through. but very much one type of people, everyone who worked around there.

what was your role? how did you enact it? what was your prop/how did you use it?

I was a fabric holder. I held green fabric and hid in green fabric. and generally was around green fabric.

I used it in two different ways, I’d either be stretching it just because I could and trying to play with space as much as possible, or I would wrap myself up in it, and often it just involved holding it and seeing what would happen in the wind, cause that was unpredictable and therefore more interesting. a couple times I was under the fabric with people, that was

“a couple times I was under the fabric with people, that was lovely, it was an enclosed space, a hidden space, almost a refuge from everything else going on around. it was like making a fort, as kids.”

lovely. it was good, because it just added another element of unpredictability i guess to what might happen, it was also kind of nice, it was an enclosed space, kind of a hidden space, almost a refuge from everything else going on around. it was like making a fort, as kids.

did your role change as we went through the acts? how so? i guess so, i mean at the beginning the role I was doing wasn’t very imaginative and i think as i got used to what i was doing i became more aware of the wind and the site and maybe my role became more imaginative. it was also interesting seeing how all the other characters developed as people got more comfortable, especially the performers, you could see how they got more and more into their characters over time, that was more interesting for me, i did different things with fabric, but i think the other guys had more development than i did.

who did you interact with? mainly i interacted with the other fabric people, the reformers, because often i’d be holding fabric with them and i felt in the performance my role

“at the beginning the role I was doing wasn’t very imaginative and i think as i got used to what i was doing i became more aware of the wind and the site and maybe my role became more imaginative.”

was really not to interact with the characters i felt i was really more a background person so i tried to often remain as inconspicuous as possible by standing really still or hiding in the fabric. the role i felt of the fabric was to kind of define the space that the focus should be on, not me. i had a few poses, that was because the wind was very strong, i had to really lung to stand upright...

did you see the space differently after we finished? yeah, i mean it made me go to areas of the site that i wouldn’t have gone to before, like using the stage for example, and i mean walking on the grass, i mean i never would have walked on the grass around there before cause it seems off limits, but i didn’t actually question it.

what was your favorite location/act? why? what happened in it?

I enjoyed the first act. mainly because there was several changes in levels, so it seemed like a more interesting movement through space, and the fabric people were at different levels and people coming up and down i thought was a kind of interesting use of the site. the others were great too, but that’s the one that really stuck with me, it adds a whole other dimension, verticality.

when/where did you find that you deviated from the instructions? what did you do then? i think towards the end when it got windier and windier, people just started doing what they could, towards the end there was a lot more movement amongst the fabric guys, towards the beginning they were a lot more stationary, which i felt was what the script desired at the time, i mean there was a slight movement, but i think as we got more into it we just kind of moved more and more.

36

“I was a fabric holder.

I held green fabric and hid in green fabric. and generally was around green fabric. I used it in two different ways, I’d either be stretching it just because I could and trying to play with space as much as possible, or I would wrap myself up in it, and often it just involved holding it and seeing what would happen in the wind, cause that was unpredictable and therefore more interesting.”

37

[guy woodhouse] reformer

>>> kim [director] cont.inued from p. 12

there was also mackenzie who was the lady, she had a magazine and she was really just in this world of her own. she ended up in a way being paired together with adam, who was the business man, they were both solo characters. mackenzie was being in the space and observing the others around her but in this kind of her own world sort of way, and the business man was moving through the space quite fast, it’s this place he knows and he’s not that interested in what’s around him. but still they tended to come together and socialize outside of the acts and then sat on the bench together. adam, the business man had a phone, that was his prop, he was constantly on the phone, texting, the way that we use technology to remove us from where we are. and mackenzie was doing that same thing with the magazine, she was removed from her setting, from the city, because she had this thing to read. and then i think the last one is nic who was the guard, and he really stayed separate from the rest the whole time. and the one thing i wish... nic only had a yellow vest, which is a prop in the way that other people notice it and people respond to it, and usually stay away from it or assume that its going to tell them they’re doing something wrong. i wish that i had given him something that made more sound, so that he was forced to engage with the other characters, because he just kept himself removed and moved in the way that guards do, surveying, stop, zig zag paths, but if he had a prop that was a walkie talkie a whistle or something that made noise, he might have used it

and then had more exchange with the other characters.

when/where did you find that you deviated from the instructions? what did you do then? there was one person missing from the green fabric group, and then a couple people showed up late so we always were having to rearrange a bit from the script, you know which is what you have to do and it wasn’t that big of a deal, we just filled the positions and left out the least important spot... it was always quite close to what was in the script, the same idea, mostly, except a couple acts where we just tried new things because of the wind, but it was never going to be exact because we were actually missing one person for the entire thing and then a couple people came and went.

did you see the space differently after we finished? yeah yeah totally. cause it always changes when suddenly you have a story that goes with a space and now i can think of how lucy had to rescue the fabric out of the water, paul climbing on the sculpture, the wind tunnel, you know its windy but you don’t know its that windy until you hold up this sheet between two people. so really each space, the way we used it, you think more about the shapes and the forms that make up the space because of using it in a certain way. and they’re all actions that are within every urban space basically, its like steps or a fence or a wall to lean upon, or a bench, but its the specific way that people used them that makes it memorable. the thing that i’ve realized now, because it went so fast when we were doing it i wasn’t really able to think about it, but now that i’ve talked to

a lot of people after the performance and heard their views on it and how they felt and how it went for them... the best part for me is really that everyone did have fun doing it, and they’re interested in the outcome and how i’m going to stitch it together and what you know, what we captured. and in a way talking about it after we’ve done it, now, you know, makes people think about how they enacted it, and different ways that we could do it. i think that if you are able to get a group of people to have fun, then interesting things come out of that, and that was the whole point, was for me to construct a set of, a script, guidelines for which people, i told people how i wanted them to move, how to act, but what comes out of that is so much more interesting, seeing how that evolves.

>>> ollie [photographer] cont.inued from p. 14

when/where did you find that you deviated from the instructions? what did you do then?

scene, so i think it’s probably the one that came across best, in photos at least... really nice kind of contrast, it’s really nice if you’re working with fabric to have directional lighting, when we were in the open air we had pretty much just light coming from all directions and that doesn’t give you great shadows and that kind of thing, so yeah, it was cracking, it wasn’t that dark but it was just... poetic.

yeah... i noticed there was a lot of scribbling going on, every break there’d be a few people off drawing pictures and just kind of changing diagrams and stuff like that. i think there was quite a lot of deviation from the script, which i think is probably what you were after... but in a very fluid, natural kind of way. i think in a way it kind of improves and expands upon people’s character if they deviate from the script.

[kim: i found that moving between

did you see the space differently after we finished?

“i think it kind of improves and expands i probably do. upon people’s character if they deviate from would probably the script.“ Ollie [photographer] i’djustseencauseit

the same thing can be said for how you learn a new place or a new city, you see it in a different way once you begin to put these stories to it, once you begin to know it better, you experience it differently, from a tourist or from the first time you are in a place to months later, years later, you suddenly know these different pieces, you know the coffee shop on that corner or the pub down there or what you talked about with a friend there, you know your way around - and that’s the same thing that we did in a condensed amount of time in that space, we got to know it a lot better and now it changes in one’s mind.

the acts and breaktime was quite interesting... you seemed to get a lot of pictures of that...] yeah i think that was kind of interesting, because there wasn’t a definitive start and a definitive end to the acts, it all kind of merged into the break and then kind of merged back out of it and it wasn’t necessarily clear exactly what was going on cause it didn’t seem like there was one controller going, okay you do this, you do that... you know on a film set its quite easy for a director just to say, you making the tea make it stronger, kind of thing. but none of that was going on, so yeah, the breaks i think were interesting, and also i think cause a lot of us didn’t know each other that well, so there was a lot of just testing the waters seeing who people were.

through a set of angles, you know, i’ve seen it through a thing that big, you know the viewfinders you use to line things up, i’ve just kind of seen it in squares. i think you view a space completely differently, when you know that if you stand at an angle here you see this building framed behind that one, kind of thing. i probably will go back there at some point, i mean its a good place between other places... and also it makes a good funny story. yeah, i had a really fun day.

38

39

[gintare rudyte] reformer

>>> dialogue w/ nat had you ever been to the exchange square before? no i’d never been to the exchange square before. i didn’t even know that it really existed. i’ve seen the steps that lead up to it on a night out, but never had gone up and i’d thought nothing more of it, and when i’d heard there’s this square that you’re doing your project in and it overlooks the station of liverpool street, i was kind of intrigued as to where it was cause i thought i knew liverpool street station quite well and i was all well maybe its where the ice rink is... and then when i arrived on the sunday i was like, oh, this place i didn’t even know exists, there’s patrick waiting in the sunshine in this amazing space that has trickling water and a stage and no one really in it. yeah i just didn’t know it existed... i suppose there are other parts of london like that, that i don’t know. it was great, just to arrive up some steps and through the dark cover of the building under that alleyway of the arch and then come out and be like, wow, there’s this whole space here... it’s a big space and i suppose if i was there on a weekday, obviously looking at the buildings around, its probably populated by many office workers, but on a weekend its just kind of couples going around or people just having a real chill out time and the fact that it was so sunny, it was just a nice space that i suppose no one really would go to unless they knew it existed, yeah and a big space in the middle of london that hasn’t been built into a tower, which is what surrounds it, but its nice to have these public spaces... well how public it is, we don’t

really know, there’s obviously the security people, turning a blind eye as they say, how much of a blind eye... and i’m glad that i hadn’t gone there before, cause then maybe in my head i would’ve gone maybe kim’s going to do this here and then maybe this here, but i suppose i’d been all the way around that space before but never in it, so its kind of interesting to go, well i’ve been to liverpool street so many times and gone in and out of trains so many times under that space and also walked around it, you know that shopping arcade that goes along it i’d been many times and never known what was on the other side - i’d just presumed offices and why would any person really go there and there’s those steps that led up and then finding that’s where you were doing the piece.

role to be in, just to work with people that i didn’t really know that well, i don’t think i really knew any of them, i kindof had conversations with them before but its fun to meet new people, i mean i suppose everyone was a bit hesitant or a bit i’m not sure what’s really going on. none of us really were that clued up, but that’s fine cause i think that led to us feeling our way along, we all kind of felt comfortable, i mean some people felt more comfortable that others, and some of us were, oh why are we under this green sheet right now, and some of us were getting in there and going, right, let’s just do it cause, why not. i mean, it just depended on the type of person that felt comfortable doing what they were doing. yeah my role was just to go to each of the scenes and use the green fabric in the way that was directed and maybe

maybe draped in the fabric, and then as we went through to the second act on the staging area and we were just kind of, blocking in a certain way and making a wall of green fabric. the role became where you just knew what your position was, it was working with the people with the fabric, holding fabric and, oh what are we going to do now, and the enactors are going to come and coincide with us and then as we went on it kind of became more fun and more fluid. and that was what was, i suppose, what we were trying to achieve, was just that we all felt more comfortable. also just getting together twenty or more people who don’t really know each other on a sunday in a central london space, just kind of do what was asked and also use their imagination, i suppose, is kind of hard, but everyone kind of got it, and was, yeah, i’m

“just getting together twenty or more people who don’t really know each other on a sunday in a central london space, to do what was asked and also use their imagination, i suppose, is kind of hard, but everyone just got it.” what was your role? how did you enact it? what was your prop/how did you use it? my role was to have a piece of the green fabric and to work with the other people in my group that had use of the fabric, be that stretching it between us, covering ourselves with it in different shapes. our first role was on these steps where the enactors were walking up through the space and we were just stretching the fabric between our bodies. yeah, it was a fun

try and find little, improvise new ways that we could use the fabric. it was fun, i was glad i was a part of that group.

how did your role change as we went through the acts? so as we went through the acts i suppose we got to know what our roles with green fabric were going to be, so the first time maybe we weren’t as sure, we were standing quite still and stationary in the first bit and then the second bit we would be covered or

gonna do this cause why not. no one was there going oh i feel really uncomfortable or oh i don’t know if i should do this or, there was no should or shouldn’t, it was, you can, just do it, even if you weren’t sure then do it go with it, see if it works. no one was really told to be within certain parameters that they should be or shouldn’t be, to just do and it was great. yeah, there was one stage where we were within the wind tunnel, well which i

would call the wind tunnel, and me and gintare, she was brilliant, it was just amazing, we just held this fabric, at first i thought why are we the only ones being completely blown by this wind, but it was because we were the first ones to the wind that was coming from the liverpool street station side and everyone else was just having an echo effect of our wind, but it was almost like, i am being really weak, but no we were holding the force of the wind and it was getting this ripple effect. it was really strong. but it was fun at the same time, how much can we hold on? and gintare was like this is tough. and it felt like we were really holding this fabric and then the enactors were coming through and trying to push on it. and then there was the big flower pots, and i thought maybe the broadgate people are going to be a bit funny if we’re on there flower beds cause i mean on a normal day you wouldn’t normally stand on a flowerbed, because its not done and if you’re on cctv you just don’t, but i thought well we’re not on a normal day, we’re on a day where we’re going to explore this space and use it to the best of our abilities and i thought, yeah we’re just going to stand on it, we’re going to get good height on the fabric and it really worked well, we got go levels of fabric and there was guy kind of holding it in the middle and, but it was just this good billowing effect and it worked, it worked really well, you just had to kind of go with it. and no one told us to stop at any point throughout the whole thing which i think that that proved that, well it was well organized and yeah, just the project worked from start to finish kind of seamlessly and we got kind of what was asked of us.

>>> continued on p.42

40

“my role was to go to each of the scenes and use the green fabric in the way that was directed and maybe try to improvise new ways that we could use the fabric... there was no should or shouldn’t, it was, just do it, see if it works. no one was really told to be within certain parameters, that they should be here or shouldn’t be there. it was great.”

41

[nat spink] reformer

>>> nat, continued from p.40 who did you interact with? are there any specific enactors that you remember, and how they touched it and worked with the fabric? so the enactors were coming and kind of using the fabric in a way or kind of playing with it. yeah the ones that particularly stood out were, lucy was the child and she was very playful, she was like i want to touch it all i want to feel it and get in there and some points she made me really laugh cause i was holding onto it and she’s really pulling on it and it made me react to that and almost fall off when i was on the flowerbed, cause i was having to balance really hard, like one foot behind the other holding this fabric, arms up high, it was like quite a tough stance to be in and she was there pulling on it and grabbing it, it was quite tough but funny at the same time. she was the most physical, the one who reacted with the fabric the most. and then i suppose the crowd who had the sticks, they were hitting it quite a lot, their faces were really stern the whole way through, i don’t know if that’s just they took on this role of i’m going to have this very straight face, but they did and they were whacking on the floor, they were the ones making the most noise and they were making these really jutting movements with their sticks onto the fabric and it was like okay okay, and also hitting the bars, but that was great cause they were making the noise and here we’re making ourselves felt and it was great.

what did it feel like the times you were hiding under the fabric and it was draped over you? yeah so when we were draped by the fabric and being kind of hidden, i quite liked that, it felt kind of comforting and you’re in a real central london public space and you’re suddenly on the cold concrete being covered by this green fabric that would really stretch around your body kind of as a cocoon and you’re with this group of people that you’re either whispering to and going are we meant to be doing this? no, you should be more here? so we were communicating with people under the fabric and also it was a shield from the sun, the sun was really hot and so it was kind of nice to have this little area where we can just be shaded. and also at the same time it was like okay what’s going on on the outside? we can’t see unless we peer out, and are we allowed to peer out? no one said we can’t, can we, are we reacting in the right way, it was all these questions - should we be looking out? maybe we should keep our hands in or maybe we can put a foot there? it was, oh i don’t know but why not, we should just try anything. and then there were some funny bits where if we did look out there’d be someone doing something funny outside. but yeah the feeling of being kind of closed under this green fabric with a group of people felt like a tent, you

got that feeling where okay we’re in this together, we’re in this thing and it feels good cause we’re this group of people, you know the green fabric group, i quite liked that part, as much as i liked being stationary and seeing how the people reacted to us. both were quite a good contrast.

when/where did you find that you deviated from the instructions? what did you do then? i think we just got more confident as the scenes went on, so by scene five, which was the chess piece, by that time, i don’t know whether we were improvising but people would go, well why not try this, it was just other ideas that would throw off each other, i suppose that’s what happens when you get a bunch of people who are architects or creative people in a room, they might go, have you thought of this... when we were on the chess piece as well we all thought, we’re here with this green fabric that we’re covering ourselves with and then there was some people going, we should hold it above our heads, and i thought no i’d quite like to just place one bit under here and create a wall around, cause i felt that feels a bit more safe, and then they were throwing the chess pieces on top of us and i suppose that was improvising, but i don’t know maybe it was in the piece that they should just

chuck chess pieces on top of our heads but i was a bit like, right, we’re under here, this fabric isn’t really going to protect us much, but it was funny cause i suppose lucy was this going i’m just going to throw, and it was funny cause then we reacted in a way, well i then, what i became was a bit more well i’m going to react and retaliate by making the fabric go a bit rigid and throw it back off, so i don’t know whether it hit anyone - i was like well you’re throwing it on us, so i’m going to try and i did hear them falling off.

did you see the space differently after we finished? oh yeah. if i went back to that space now, well its my first time there which is interesting, i’ve also reacted to that space very differently in the fact that i’ve sat on steps i would never sit on in the middle of the day, i’ve sat on a chess board i probably never would have done that or thought to do that, or stood or sat on that wall part. or even left my bag, it kind of all led us to think, oh we can leave our bags there it’s all right, but on a weekday you wouldn’t just leave a personal bag with important stuff there just behind a wall, but its fine cause we’re with this group. i think our thinking was different, i would never stand on a massive flowerpot like that in a central london space because i know that i’m being watched by lots of

people and there’s so much cctv around there i’d get told to leave the space. i’d love to go back there now. i’ll probably tell people, oh there’s this great square by liverpool street there’s water, you can’t put your feet in, weirdly enough, don’t know why, there’s grass but you can’t go on it, but louise pulls people around on it - its so weird there’s grass that you can’t sit on! don’t get that really. yeah if i go back, i’ll always remember that there’s green fabric day. i just find that area of london so weird. on my way to get there i walked through another square, and i mean its so well signed around there, this way to exchange place, this way to exchange square, so i knew where i was going, but there were other squares that were equally like that, that had one or two people in them surrounded by tower blocks, just kind of disused on the weekends. its kind of sad in a way... the space needs to be used, there’s this space that’s so used on the weekdays and not at all on the weekend, there’s grass and flowing water... it made me think. yeah, no i really enjoyed it. i suppose to be honest at the beginning, i wasn’t sure about a sunday given to something that i didn’t really know what was going to happen, i read some of the handout, but really didn’t know and i suppose not knowing is some of the apprehension, and then three hours later, really enjoyed it. met and talked to some really great people that i wouldn’t have.

“i’d love to go back there now. i’ll probably tell people, oh there’s this great square by liverpool street - there’s water, you can’t put your feet in, weirdly enough, don’t know why, there’s‘its just brilliant. it was different i was a grass but you can’t go on it, but louise pulls people around on and fun and i’m glad that part of it.’ it - its so weird there’s grass that you can’t sit on! don’t get that really.”

42

43

[rich hardy] reformer

was being blown by the wind and much less about the people moving through.

>>> PAtrick [video] cont.inued from p. 18 how did your role change as we went through the acts? i think people got more comfortable with their roles, they were able to explore it a little bit more the first one they didn’t really know what to do, but later on they figured out how to act in a certain way. and i think green fabric people as well, they figured out how to make more space with the fabric, and i think that’s a whole other thing, isn’t it, people getting comfortable with this and making it more... [kim: but its the same thing, its part of it all...] yeah, yeah.

what was your favorite location/ act? why? what happened in it? i can tell you my least favorite... i didn’t like the steps for some reason, i think its really hard to separate space and action, because it felt uncomfortable in a sense, it was more of a movement through instead of a movement in, it seemed like a more transient movement. i really liked the chess pieces cause there was a kind of center, there was something to circulate around and there was less of a line. i think the last scene through the tunnel was really interesting, because it was really dramatic in the space that was created, but it was less character driven and more spatially driven, it was more about the structure of the fabric. it was so dramatic in terms of the way it

but where was the fabric most effective? that’s an interesting one to think of... i think maybe the fabric was really effective on the edge, when we had the edge next to the statue the fabric kind of extended that wall in a way that was really quite interesting, even though you didn’t really interact with it, it kind of changed the structure of the space, it had a bigger impact. whereas on the stairs i just didn’t see the fabric make that much difference spatially to me.

when/where did you find that you deviated from the instructions? what did you do then? to be honest, it was too complicated for me to look at everyone’s route everytime, i couldn’t tell you if they were deviating, probably the biggest deviators were lucy and juliette [mother and child] because they saw loads of interesting stuff going on and just went for it. i think the rest tended to stick to their routes, people were conscious of doing it properly. [kim: i found the inbetween bits, the breaks, just as or more interesting... can you talk about those? and the others ways that people figured out how to use the fabric...] well i can talk about one specifically - i think the best inbetween was climbing the statue, i think that was amazing, paul just scaled this massive bronze sculpture then everyone started draping the green fabric it. it was really cool. and who would have thought that all your need is a bit of green fabric to make it all a bit more poignant. i mean i think what putting the fabric on the statue really emphasizes is that its something that’s really fun. and there’s so many

reason to not have fun, but a sense of fun and a sense of joy and, something that’s really just exciting and just for the hell of it. i mean you look at this from the outside and, okay we’re going to put a little green fabric on the sculpture, it sounds ridiculous, we’re all twenty-plus years old, and here we are dancing around in this square, shouting, some are climbing the statue and putting green fabric over like the boobs of this massive proper sculpture, and its hilarious and

did you see the space differently after we finished? well, its the same, the space, i’ll see it as the same space, i’ll have the memory of what we’ve done, but what we’ve done was then and it was a time based thing at a certain moment, and we were all doing certain things and it was four hours and it was really interesting and really great but when i go back there again the kind of poignancy of being in that moment with

“there’s so many things that are difficult and so much of architecture is really serious, but to have a bit of fun and to have a bit of playful nature, and i think that’s what the green fabric really brought and people suddenly realized - that here’s this prop that suddenly makes it okay to have a bit of fun.“ it’s great and there’s so many things that are difficult and so much of architecture is really serious, but to have a bit of fun and to have a bit of playful nature, and i think that’s what the green fabric really brought and people suddenly realized - that here’s this prop that suddenly makes it okay to have a bit of fun, a kind of pop, a kind of excitment. [kim: well that was, really what the whole thing was about, right? using this place that is so one dimensional and so hard, and only used by people working there at lunch time - and using it in a whole other way, in a fun way, the fabric was this soft thing that allowed it to happen.] good thing we had the fabric.

that group of people and that mix of people and fabric and space, well its gone, we can remember it in picture and film and it’ll be great to remember it, but i think going back... its like going back to a space where you had a really great experience somewhere and you go back there and you remember that but the space is still the same, especially if the space is like broadgate, it doesn’t have a meaning in itself, we gave the space a meaning for that bit of time but, but it was that bit of time only. to me, for me personally, i wouldn’t go back there and reflect as much as someone else might, you know i’d think about it, its just my way of thinking, this was good but i’m in the space again and now its empty.

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[anna long] reformer

>>> dialogue w/ johannes had you ever been to the exchange square before? no. not really, i’ve only been in the area, but the square? no. i thought, whoa, i didn’t expect it, i mean i knew that there were these weird empty squares around, but i didn’t know about how many and how extreme. i got there by liverpool street and i thought i knew where it is, i thought i could enter directly from the station, and i couldn’t and then i had to walk around and up the stairs from scene 1.

what was your role? how did you enact it? what was your prop/how did you use it? my role was the reformer. and that meant that i had green fabric and i was more stationary piece of the performance in that i was somewhere in the scene not really moving but, just stretching the fabric, alone or with others or wrapping myself. [kim: and how did it feel differently, from stretching to draping it?] first one i think physically the

how did your role change as we went through the acts? yeah, i think the scenes were very different, for example the first scene with the stairs was quite narrow, just the physical scene was quite narrow to begin with so in a sense our, the obstacle that the fabric made was more important maybe. and in the other scenes sometimes we were more framing, i mean it really was different from scene to scene i guess, sometimes it was more backdrop, sometimes it more really in the scene.

who did you interact with? other green fabric people, mainly it was chao, in the end though, we were a team of stretching fabric. but it changed really, sometimes it was more single stretching or wrapping. and with the actors of course we didn’t interact too much, we were more acted on sometimes, meaning that because in a sense, i interpreted the role of the reformer that you were not really an actor in that you couldn’t react to what the people did, so they sometimes played with the fabric, but we didn’t play with the people.

what was your favorite location/act? why? what happened in it? i think from the fabric perspective the most spectacular was the last act, with the doorway cause there was such a strong wind you really could almost lean into the fabric when you held it with two people. and even alone you could just really fly it nicely. but spatially, i narrowest spaces more a reformer point of had the feeling that impact because people

want in a sense because they could afford it, and what they come up with is that? its kind of disappointing from an architectural point of view, that people who could in a sense, could have the square they want and then its that? no... it was fun, as i wrote on my sheet.

found always the interesting from view because you you had a bigger really became an obstacle.

when/where did you find that you deviated from the instructions? what did you do then? i mean i don’t know, i think they kept them quite okay, i only really knew my own instructions in both scenes, of course we adjusted them a bit to how many were available for reforming, but it was mostly more or less like the instructions were.

“spatially, i found always the narrowest spaces more interesting from a reformer point of view because you had the feeling that you had a bigger impact because people really became an obstacle.”

difference was, when you stretch it there was the wind and the resistance with the fabric was more effort. when you wrap yourself, it was in a sense, easier. but on the other hand you couldn’t see the scene, so that’s the basic difference, when i was stretching it i was seeing the actors and when i was covered with the fabric, we had to guess what was going on.

[kim: the green fabric people, you really were paired together in a team, and had to work together a lot...] yeah, it was true.

did you see the space differently after we finished? yeah, definitely. i think the first impression of the space is that its quite ugly in a sense, i find it quite depressing. actually when i went there in the morning on my way there, there are these people who in a sense, i mean its about making money, the square, and they could have any square they

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“with the actors we didn’t interact too much, we were more acted on sometimes, because i interpreted the role of the reformer as you were not really an actor, in that you couldn’t react to what the people did, so they sometimes played with the fabric, but we didn’t play with the people.“

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[johannes muntinga] reformer

>>> kelly, james & paul [the crowd] cont.inued from p. 22 kelly: yeah, if we had anything it was probably more of an intimate connection with the fabric, rather than a general one. because we were a crowd we were really only able to touch it on the off times. paul: and we had our sticks and they had their fabric. kelly: yeah so we were happy with our props and they were happy with their fabric.

what was your favorite location/ act? why? what happened in it? james: i think i enjoyed the break part most, because i pissed around... as has been described. kelly: i don’t know i thought that the first one, the stair one, was quite good because it was a focused area and it was easy to manipulate and potentially it could have been even more amazing if the green fabric had made literally a bottleneck or something and then everyone was meeting at that bottleneck at the same time, it could have been quite interesting. it was easily controlled in terms of which way everyone went, you know you couldn’t necessarily go around someone and you had to interact more than necessarily with any of the other scenes where you could have just gone around them. paul: i think i agree with the first scene, the steps, out of all of them, its just a classic thing with the form of them. and we were just the crowd moving up and down them

but that was when you were conscious of zayne and louise who were doing their own sort of meeting on the steps...

when/where did you find that you deviated from the instructions? what did you do then? kelly: we did, but not that much. james: we were good at keeping each other in check. paul: between the three of us... kelly: between the three of us somebody knew where we were supposed to go, so i think that helped... james: it was usually kelly. kelly: yep it was usually me. james: i was usually struggling to know which way the map went, i would have started in the wrong place...

did you see the space differently after we finished? kelly: oh yeah, of course, yeah. absolutely. just because we’ve looked at it and used it in different ways, in segments. james: you could always draw it. whereas ususlly if you just wander around a square you’d struggle to know how it works, but to have actually engaged with it for such a long period of time, you get another sense of it. kelly: you can draw that, yeah... paul: you’ve exercised different elements kelly: yeah it was really fun. james: it was a beautiful day..

>>> zayne [a stranger] continued from p. 26 and then we had the break, and i didn’t see her for a long time and i kept on saying things like, oh louise found this other man... we came back together, and it just felt like business around the statue, yeahyeahyeah, i just felt really sober and just doing this thing that was very straight forward and we’re going to lean on the thing. and fabric really got in the way of everything, i was trying to make everything feel really casual and normal and it wasn’t, this fabric was really getting in the way. and then we came back together at the chess set and were like, LOOK what’s going on with this, kim’s messed up multiple times with planning our movements, we’ve really got to take this into our hands. and so we planned out the movements, cause there were two points where we were going to do stuff, and both of our trajectories hit both of them and we were starting at either end, and so for us to tap our bottles at both points wouldn’t have made any sense because... we wouldn’t be at the same point... and so we decided that we would cheers while sitting on the bench and we would also cheers while we were messing around with the chess set. that was really nice. oh yeah and sitting down and cheersing felt really casual and that’s when we finally opened our bottles. really relaxed and normal. and then the guy who was taking pictures came over and asked, hey can you guys do a big cheesy cheers? and it was like, oh its not really cheesy anymore its like normal, but okay we’ll do cheesy. the one in the tunnel just felt chaotic

and i lost sight of our relationship, that was the end, i kind of wanted there to be this sort of intuitive, we’re going to be drawn to hovering around the same person, because where they ended up getting together with the fabric didn’t correlate to your diagram, of course... so we did the first ones where we just went through the thing and that was straight forward and then the second one really wasn’t coordinated and i was kind of trying to secretly pay attention to what louise was going to be doing, but it didn’t really work out. and i think we ended up choosing different people that time and i just ended up following her so we could go cheers by the same person.

performing a really specific act being a character so i wasn’t really thinking about what i was doing necessarily as myself, i was just going into this place that was potentially really dangerous, people were throwing stuff on top of it and i got hit on the head and it hurt, but i was doing it because it was like, oh this is my role and i’m going to do this thing. and that was really fun. and it was really intimate in there and really kind of nice. and your friend, richard, was in there and we were like, hi we’re really into it right now and we’re picking up these chess pieces. but i was too big. there wasn’t much room in there and there was like ten people trying to fit in.

[kim: in louise’s book she writes, we’re growing distant.] yeah yeah. i remember that.

did you see the space differently after we finished?

who did you interact with? in a way i was interacting with a lot of people but it wasn’t specific to anyone... in the first one i felt very conscious of where... the guy with the glasses, tall... johannes, i felt very conscious of where he was in the first part cause we, louise and i, organized what we were going to do around her being behind johannes and me ending behind johannes. we lagged a lot before that one because we were, louise and i, really intently making notes and talking about a lot of stuff and planning out the situations.

what was your favorite location/act? why? what happened in it? probably the chess one because it felt like we really established a relationship to an extent and we were taking control of what was going on. and it also felt quite casual and comfortable. and the chess area felt really fun at the same time with the canopy, cause i felt like i was

i don’t know. cause i’ve only had that experience there really. so i’m sure i’d think of it in relation to this. i do kind of want to go back there. i feel like i didn’t get to explore the space as much as i wanted to, there’s lots of areas that felt less punctuated, i guess, and i want to go back and see what those spaces are like. specifically there’s the big black tunnel pathway that we went through, and then around that opening there’s what seems like this nook and i want to see what’s going on. and also there’s the staircases that go into the european investment bank, on the other side of the sculpture, i wonder where those go. and i know that there’s some point through that row of shops there’s an entryway and there’s a service feeling car park, i think there’s a walkway that connects up to the square, and i want to go and see if that’s true. and i want to go and revisit that walkway to see if it actually is the same one i went through. and i’ve got no idea where that street is where we ended up on the first shot, i’d like to go see what that is...

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[chao han] reformer

act one the entry, a cinematic stairway stariway >

a compressed space of constrasting shadows, leading into and out of the exchange square, stepping up and down, the beginning movement,

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“I enjoyed the first act. mainly because there were several changes in levels, so it seemed like a more interesting movement through space, and the fabric people were at different levels was an interesting use of the site. that’s the one that really stuck with me, it adds a whole other dimension, verticality.� Guy [reformer]

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the lady [mackenzie] walkSsbehind the green fabric down the stairs. while patrick [video] in the back films her.

“the stair was quite good because it was a focused area, easy to manipulate and potentially it could have been even more amazing if the green fabric had literally made a bottleneck and then everyone was meeting at that same time.�

Kelly [the crowd]

gintare & chao

mother & child, taking a picture

reforming space up the stairs

stretch the fabric long & high

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the re[form]ers stretch the green fabric up above their heads and under their feet to new make vertical planes in the space, changing the movement of the en[act]ors.

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“when we were draped by the fabric, being hidden, i quite liked that, it felt comforting, you’re in a real central london public space and you’re suddenly on the cold concrete being covered by this green fabric that would really stretch around your body as a cocoon and you’re with this group of people that you’re whispering to. it was a shield from the hot sun. and also at the same time it was like, what’s going on outside? we can’t see unless we peer out, are we allowed to peer out?” ” Nat [reformer]

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all the reformers are sit on the steps, gathered together under the fabric, looking like a bunch of pebbles rolling down or a long caterpillar.

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a lump of green with a person underneath

five people gathered under the fabric sheet

lucy climbing under the fabric caterpillar

“i really liked the first act when i got to crawl through the human bodies, that was really fun, maybe because that’s the first thing i did and it was new and shocking.”

Lucy [the child]

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“aesthetically, the stair setting, it reminded me of cinematic romance... this ‘we’re passing strangers thing,’ it felt very serious.” zayne [a stranger] crossing paths with louise [the other stranger]

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act two watch & perform >

observe as the audience from the seating, and perform as you JUMP on the stage.

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“[the performance] made me go to areas of the site that i wouldn’t have gone to before, like the stage, or walking on the grass, i never would have walked on the grass around there before cause it seems off limits, but i didn’t actually question it.”

Guy [reformer]

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all the enactors walk from the seating as the audience, up to the stage, perform a jump, then walk back to their seats; mackenzie [the lady] and lucy and juliette [mother and child] are seen making their way to the stage.

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the crowd sitting, watching the stage

the child, playing

walking on the grass...

“i feel like each scene had a relationship between the fabric and the people and the space that a kid could really enjoy.�

Lucy [the child] 64

“okay what’s happened is that we’ve been romantic on the stairs, and now the jumping thing. and i felt very disconnected from her, and it was sort of sad and we didn’t spend any time with each other. and jumping, it was sort of a silly thing to be doing and i was thinking about other things.”

Zayne [a stranger]

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after being on the stage the enactors return to their seats; adam [the businessman] and the crowd are pictured in front of reformers, johannes and anna, wrapped up in the green fabric.

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the crowd with their sticks making noise

mother & child playing with a sheet of fabric

the reformers draped under their fabric, like pebbles

the reformers peeking out

“it was interesting to see how some people just did a very tiny jump and some jumped quite high- their character’s behaviour (or their’s) came through in their jump.“ kim [director] 68

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act three on the other side of the edge >

LOOK. down into the station and see the trains, up at the elegant truss structure of the station. let the green fabric frame the views.

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the reformers hold the fabric vertically to frame the space for the enactors to look down into the station through; lucy [child] plays with the fabric while juliette [mother] takes a picture, the crowd, businessman, and lady stand at the fence, and the guard approaches.

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“there was a definitive moment half way through in everything that was going on, where [the strangers] would come together and chink their glasses and you’d know then, this is half way over.” Ollie [photographer]

louise & zayne [strangers] clinking their bottles

the businnessman, moving quickly

the lady in her own world

the child touching the softness

“I guess looking into the rail tracks is the one I kind of didn’t follow the exact directions, but my position was in the sun and I wanted to be in the shade.”

Adam [businessman]

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act three scene one two

the reformers stand on the flowerbeds and use the wind to get lift on the fabric above their heads; duane [still video] is in the foreground, patrick [hand held video] follows an enactor, ollie [photographer] captures the scene, and zayne [stranger] waits for louise to clink glasses with, lucy [child] jumps to try to touch the fabric, mackenzie [lady] reads her magazine, and nic [guard] surveys everyone.

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louise having a peek

anna holding the fabric up high

mother & child gripping the fence

everyone at the fence

“louise said this thing when we were up at the edge, ‘ooo so romantic.’ and i was like, oh yeah that’s what’s going on this is really romantic. and then i think in my character i was feeling really jealous of her and protective which is really weird, i don’t know how that happened. “ zayne [a stranger] 78

“on a normal day you wouldn’t stand on a flowerbed in the City, you’re on cctv, but i thought well we’re not on a normal day, we’re on a day where we’re going to explore this space and use it to the best of our abilities and, yeah we’re just going to stand on it and get good height on the fabric. it really worked well, we got levels of fabric and there was Guy kind of holding it in the middle. it was just this good billowing effect and it worked.”

Nat [reformer]

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the in-between breaktime: twirl, climb, lie, rest, write, play > how many ways can you use the green fabric?

disregard the rules, and see: spin in the grass, climb the scultpure, dip your feet in the water, and more.

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“there wasn’t a definitive start and a definitive end to the acts, it all kind of merged into the break and then kind of merged back out of it.”

Ollie [photographer] “it was fun to see people take over that grass. take over that space and make it their own by the improbable act of swinging other people around in a piece of green fabric.“ nat [reformer]

james: “i think the best thing was kelly recreating the statue on her bit of fabric.” kelly: “cause we were on the grass, and i didn’t think we were allowed to be on the grass... but then we got on the grass anyways. and we were playing with the fabric and they were swinging me around in the fabric and i looked up and the statue had a fabric draped around her, and i was like, oh i’m going to do that to me, and then james took a picture, i didn’t take my clothes off completely like the statue... it was a mock interpretation. that was fun.” [the crowd]

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‘the in-between bits were as interesting to me as the actual acts. within them is when people came up with many other wasys to use the fabric and all the ‘please do not... go on the greass, touch the water’ signs were completely disregarded.’ kim [director] “paul climbed up on the statue, he managed to drape the fabric on the sculpture’s face.” james [the crowd]

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“i rescued that fabric!” lucy [child]

“i did a fashion show with nat and i think that had a effect on the other people who were using the space, i know there’s some pictures of me with the tourists behind looking at me...” James [the crowd]

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“then we had the break, and i didn’t see her for a long time and i kept on saying things like, oh louise found this other man...” zayne [a stranger]

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act four gusts of wind on the ledge>

a big bronze sculpture behind, running runnnig water below, a leaning wall, leaning and wall, THE WIND. and THE d see WIND. what lethappens. it fly.

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“i think maybe the fabric was really effective on the edge, when we had the edge next to the statue the fabric kind of extended that wall in a way that was really quite interesting, even though you didn’t really interact with it, it changed the structure of the space, it had a bigger impact.”

Patrick [hand held video]

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the reformers [chao and johannes in foreground] are spread out and sitting on the ledge, creating an upper wall around the ledge that is constantly in flux as it waves in the wind.

james reaches up to the fabric, adam [businessman] walks towards him

james peeks over the ledge

kelly looks up, while james and paul look down

the crowd lean and contemplate

“[the crowd] were the ones making the most noise and they were making these really jutting movements with their sticks onto the fabric and it was like okay okay, but that was great cause they were making this noise they were like, here we are making ourselves felt.�

Nat [reformer] 90

“patrick, who was filming with the hand-held camera, was really a part of the action. you’re very aware of him recording you. this space is corporate and being the City you’re always being watched by these CCTV cameras yet you’re much less aware that you’re always on camera then. but when there’s a camera in your face that like or always following you around, you feel differently about it.” kim [director] 91

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reformers [nat and gintare] let the fabric fly into an arch above the ledge, and the crowd [paul, james and kelly] lean on the wall with their sticks in hand.

“you get two people like zayne and louise who are obviously really into this and decide let’s write a love story on our paths about how much we adore each other even though we’ve met only fifteen minutes ago, but we’ve been given this role so we’re going to really live this role.“ Patrick [hand held video]

strike a pose

the strangers meet again

louise & zayne, trying to be casual

“it just felt like business around the statue, really sober and okay we’re just doing this thing that was very straight forward and we’re going to lean on the wall. the fabric really got in the way of everything and i was trying to make everything feel really casual and normal and it really wasn’t.” zayne [a stranger]

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“I was the businessman. My prop was a mobile phone, so basically I was someone who exists moving through a public space but he’s really not engaging in it because of this device which takes him into his own world, doing his own thing.“ Adam [businessman] 95

act five a chaotic chess set & a green bench >

the chess fort. becoming kids again, character roles are more inventive and more fun.

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“I decided to pile all the chess pieces on [lucy, the child], because I thought, you know the business man was just passing by and sees these things and decides to pile them all on one person, I thought that was kind of symbolic of this managerial person who just kind of piles all the work on somebody...�

Adam [businessman]

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act five hree scene one

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the reformers [guy and rich] stretch the fabric out vertically as a backdrop for all the commotion that is happening on the chessboard with adam [businessman] piling chess pieces onto lucy [child], while the crowd and louise move through.

zayne sits alone on the bench...

then he’s joined by louise and they do a big cheesy...

...cheers

we’re breaking the rules, they say together.

“we came back together at the chess set and were like, LOOK what’s going on with this, kim’s messed up multiple times with planning our movements, we’ve really got to take this into our hands. so we planned out the movements, cause there were two points where we were going to do stuff, and both of our trajectories hit both of them and we were starting at either end, and so for us to tap our bottles at both points wouldn’t have made any sense because... we wouldn’t be at the same point... we would cheers while sitting on the bench and we would also cheers while we were messing around with the chess set. that was really nice, sitting down and cheersing felt really casual and that’s when we finally opened our bottles. really relaxed and normal. and then the guy who was taking pictures came over and asked, hey can you guys do a big cheesy cheers? and it was like, oh its not really cheesy anymore its normal, but okay we’ll do cheesy. it felt like we really established a relationship and we were taking control of what was going on. and it also felt quite casual and comfortable. and the chess area felt really fun at the same time with the canopy,” zayne [a stranger]

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“when we were on the chess piece we all thought, we’re here with this green fabric that we’re covering ourselves with and we should hold it above our heads, and i thought no i’d quite like to just place one bit under here and create a wall around me, cause that feels a bit more safe. and then they were throwing the chess pieces on top of us, i was a bit like, right, we’re under here, this fabric isn’t really going to protect us much, and it was funny cause then we reacted in a way, like i’m going to retaliate by making the fabric go a bit rigid and throw it back off at them...”

Nat [reformer]

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the reformers make a tent structure out of the green fabric, holding it above and around them while they sit on the chess board; lucy [the child] has fun tossing the chess pieces on top of the fort.

reformer [rich] covering the bench

the businessman sits down on the green bench

he is joined by the lady she is reading, he is texting

the lady is joined by the child with a chess piece and a off-duty reformer

“in our group there were a couple sets of two and adam and i were singles and so then we kind of ended up being another set of two in a way, which is funny.� mackenzie [the lady] 104

“i really liked the chess pieces cause there was a kind of center, there was something to circulate around and there was less of a line.”

Patrick [hand held video]

“i felt like i was performing a really specific act being a character so i wasn’t really thinking about what i was doing necessarily as myself, i was just going into this place that was potentially really dangerous, people were throwing stuff on top of it and i got hit on the head and it hurt, but i was doing it because it was my role. and it was really intimate in there and really kind of nice.” zayne [a stranger]

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act six the womb like wind tunnel passage >

an unexpcted wind tunnel in a dark womb-like passage: creates fun new shapes and ways to use the fabric, cutting off bodies and allowing for strange interation.

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“the wind was just fantastic in that tunnel. it was blustering about everywhere, everybody was being quite dragged along by the fabric, almost as if the fabric was really playing a participatory role in the whole thing because it had a mind of its own, one minute it came this way and the next going that way, or running into the back of it... also the lighting falling on the green, coming from a photography point of view, it was a really well lit scene, so i think it’s probably the one that came across best, in photos at least... great shadows, so yeah, it was cracking, it wasn’t that dark but it was just... poetic. “ Ollie [photographer] 4

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all the enactors move through and under the smaller passage within the larger passage, which is formed by the reformers holding the fabric above their heads in between each other, struggling against the wind that is being blown wildly towards them, making for quite an obstacle course to get through; here the crowd moves fowward, the child with has her hand up ready to feel the fabric, and the lady walks in the other direction in the distance.

“when we were within the wind tunnel, and me and gintare... we were holding the force of the wind and it was getting this ripple effect. it was really strong. but it was fun at the same time, how much can we hold on? it felt like we were really holding this fabric and then the enactors were coming through and pushing against it.� Nat [reformer] 110

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lucy & juliette: mother & child

zayne, missing louise “the tunnel just felt chaotic and i lost sight of our relationship, i kind of wanted there to be this sort of intuitive, we’re going to be drawn to hovering around the same person, i was trying to secretly pay attention to what louise was going to be doing, but it didn’t really work out. and i think we ended up choosing different people that time and i just ended up following her so we could go cheers by the same person.” zayne [a stranger]

rich & guy, all wrapped up

nic, the guard: having fun in the wind tunnel

“[the space] has a different memory now, a very specific one.” nic [guard] 112

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the reformers are spread out individually in the passage, letting the wind push the fabric against their bodies in different ways; adam [businessman] and nic [guard] are moving through and around the reformers, while patrick [hand held video] is filming lucy and juliette [mother and child] playing wiht the fabric draped over a reformer.

“combining the green fabric and people with the wind created all these weird, almost creepy forms within this dark passage under the building. it felt like another world.� kim [director]

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everyone to their places

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reformers spread out on the ground

in the dark passage, with the bright world just outside

the child steps over the stretched fabric

“[the last act] was the only one in which i really interacted with, not really other people, but with the fabric, walking through the fabric, and under it.�

Nic [guard]

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the enactors pushed against the fabric as it was being blown against them and it created amazing forms and shapes, cutting off their bodes and making for strange interactions.

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“the wind tunnel was created because of how the buildings were situated. the fabric extenuated this wind tunnel... the characters moving through the wind tunnel are interacting with the fabric by pushing it and getting their silhouette... this talks to me more about the atmospheres and conditions and people as objects and the material of the fabric - they react to that condition and then they create a set of situations based on the placement of the characters and the objects within that condition.� Adam [businessman]

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subsequently >

since that was the first time we performed it, and it’s written as a script that could be performed again... what could make it better? what you would change, add, take away, to build on what occurred? what else?

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after the performance, sunday roast at the pub

lucy [the child] i think while it was good having mother and son, it may have been more interesting to have two kids, because then you could have used the fabric as a placing between two people or the spaces as a plaything between two rather than a mother son figure or a sort of responsive figure, a foil to each other, then you end up having fights, or playing or hiding. i think that might have been less subtle, but maybe sortof a larger thing. maybe if there were two it would be easier to make it more play.

so you didn’t really feel that until you saw the other people doing it, you didn’t feel it so much when you saw it all on paper and it was sortof hypothetical activities, you really need the people to make you believe in that kind of thing.

GUY [reformer] I guess just having more performers would be interesting. and also i think, using larger things, large objects that didn’t involve people, and just leaving them and moving them around could also be kindof interesting, like obelisks or

what is it asking? if its not meant to ask, then do you just use it as a spatial thing. do you use it for its materiality, or do you go beyond its materiality and use it as a metaphor, by having some type of dialogue with it? or is it just a thing that responds to its atmosphere by moving which says something about the space constructed around it.

duane [still video] I think I would make it a little more performative, especially if you were able to get the same people, you could then ask more of them, have them

“now i could draw it. whereas usually if you just wander around a square you’d struggle to know how it works, but to have actually engaged with it for such a long period of time, you get another sense of it.”

James [the crowd] kim: what i love about how you took on the character is really that it was about play, the whole thing. i mean, playing in this corporate environment that is very much about hard work and this one thing and using the space in a way that its not usually used. lucy: yeah, it was. i think i mentioned this before, it was amazing coming up to the group and everyone was in their black with the green fabric flying around and when you’re arriving you kind of realize that yeah it was a group of people doing this thing and a, a real performance, and a real change of activity within the space. it was quite shocking in a way, and really quite impressive.

massive inflatable spheres or something like that. i mean the possibilities are there, you’ve got something you can work with. but yeah i think, busier, more characters i think adds a lot more contrast to what was going on.

ADAM [businessman] I guess it’d be how is there a relationship between the fabric and the characters and is there meant to be a relationship or an interaction between the fabric and the characters, because the fabric is situated in the space, the people move through the space and, you know are they meant to be directed by the fabric, are they meant to go through it, what exactly -is there a dialogue? is there meant to be a dialogue, if so what does it say,

improvise more and have them play more characters. talking about the idea of the faux romance that developed between a couple of the characters, you know, stuff like that could be let in from the start, you could take a sort of character descriptor beyond what it was going into the first performance, take it on from what it became through that first performance and give the roles even more scripting,

ollie [photographer] not sure, i think its almost impossible to say because i was seeing it through such limited eyes, i was only seeing it through a purely stills point of view and not completely engaging with the story that was going on around. so i think probably reading the script a

lot better before i went back into it. to improve it as a story... i really liked the fluidity, i think it was nice that people brought very much their own character into it, so i think just allowing it to be very malleable again is important.

nat [reformer] i think the space was amazing, and i think the space would work well to be done again, but the fact that you’ve got london out there, you could probably use another public, or public/ private space, either in the city or in central london that would work well. i’d be interested to see if more people with maybe different colored fabrics, but i don’t know if that would get too much, i don’t know what the green represented, i mean it was a great vibrant color and it worked well with the sun, it shows up well against the black that we were wearing. maybe the amount of fabric people was right, but maybe more enactors, more more, throw more of them in to really mess things up and maybe so the space could actually echo a busy city day. i know from seeing photos, there are shit loads of people on those steps and that might be hard to get, but it could be a possibility, that would be really interesting to see. or, if you could get permission, to do it on a day that it isn’t closed off and was full of people, but i think they’d be very reluctant cause they’d be on their lunch break, but it’d be interesting to see, to provoke reactions from them, yeah, if they were in their board meeting the next monday and showed a clip of what we did - i’d love to see that, they’d probably be like, what? this goes on in the exchange square on a sunday, because in a way that’s their space monday to friday everyday that’s what they know, its almost like

their playground, but on a sunday we took over what they know, we got their chess pieces, we took over their stage, we were using their steps, their wall, taking the fun out of their statue that’s hideous - i mean it would be amazing to see what reaction they would get from that. i wonder what they would actually really think, would they think is this weird, is this great, is this... i think it’d be great to do it again, but i’d be intrigued to see what another space that is like that, highly populated in the weekday, cause i think there are loads of places like that in london. just those places in the city on the weekend that are just dead.

Mackenzie [the lady] i don’t know, i think it was interesting cause it was the right amount of directing people but i think it could go either way, it could go less directed or more directed and it would be interesting, do you know what i mean? i guess depending on what you’re looking for. i think you could create better characters if you had a couple people who were more specifically in roles, who you knew could act...

kelly, james & paul [the crowd] james: i wonder if the crowd should be less choreographed. because as the crowd is potentially doing very strange things paul: yeah randomizing things kelly: i think generally if you’re given a task as okay in this scene at some point you are supposed to look over the edge and watch the trains and then the rest of it is interact with the space. you know your goal is to

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walk up the stairs and there are these obstacles, i don’t know what they are, they’re just there you just walk around them as your assigned character. or, so i want you sit on this bench and/ or play with these chess sets but do it how you want, this is your scene... or i want you to lean against the wall and contemplate something. like if it was a little more vague for people, obviously not for the green people cause you want them to be what’s to manipulate and to see the differences that happen with the different positions and things, the actors are more vaguely descripted, it may not be exactly what you expect, but it may be a bit more interesting. james: there was a real quality in the way that some people, i think lucy in particular, were just doing things which weren’t necessarily scripted but were fun...

kelly: ...but were to character, i think that’s quite good. paul: well i think some of it could be pursued particularly by the crowd, because you’ve got an idea about how you expect the space to be manipulated or what you expect the space will do and that’s something that you can pursue in the sense that you can never anticipate how people will work, and all the eventuality or possibilities of how people will react to that space, although you’re deliberately trying to do that with the design, you can’ ever anticipate everyone’s responses. kelly: but i think that’s the whole point, isn’t it.

patrick [handheld video]

Johannes [reformer]

if we were going to do this again, and we had a lot more money, a lot more time, a lot more people, and a lot more resources - i would make it just massive, like huge, such a big event that you couldn’t not notice it. i mean you couldn’t not notice it anyways if you were walking through the square on sunday you would have seen what was going on... but something so extraordinary that it would have just blown your mind: green fabric is like eight meters tall, people are on stilts, just a really big event, an exciting piece of urban theater, i mean i think we did it and it was really awesome but i think that going big, big scale, it’s all just a bit more exciting.

good question, humm, i think the location, i was quite convinced by the location because it had this artificialness to it but without being, well on the other hand it was quite common or not special place, it was not very famous architecture or very beautiful architecture so in a sense, i mean that’s what i liked. so could it be repeated in a different place? i think it could, i mean for me now it’s kind of hard to separate it from the place i think, hard to imagine. i mean it was good cause there’s not so many places that are that empty on a sunday, at all on some days, that was good because it was a place, in the City an urban place that you could find empty, there’s not so many places that get that empty at a normal time.

‘its such a hard space, and i was constantly scared, especially moving in an erratic way that i wouldn’t normally move in, that i was going to fall over on these really shiny hard surfaces and how painful that would be. and how hard that kind of architecture is, and how the people and the fabric that you introduced in the end are these soft things, there’s nothing soft about that architecture at all, except this perfect grass with a fence around it and this beautiful water -that i got to go in to save the blown away fabric- apart from that, the softness is just so contained and i don’t know why, i mean i don’t get it.’ lucy [the child] 125

Nicolas [the guard] yeah, i think that probably, cause it was three hours, two, three hours? i think even though people would start to get bored or whatever, i think to make it just a bit longer, then probably the last hour would be the most productive one, cause people are really into the thing then, the inhibitions are gone, do you know what i mean - if that would be the objective of the exercise. do you know, even me, i’m not really that prone to interact... but at the end i was already jumping into the fabric... so probably just make it longer.

Zayne [stranger passing] if it were to happen again, i’m interested in it happening in the same place, cause it would lend to being more reflective about things. and i would like to spend more time in that space where something like that’s happened to begin with.

i’d probably start asking you a lot of questions and i’d want to see the documentation and see the video... cause there’s a lot of stuff that i was thinking about while we were doing it, and i was trying to meet your needs in a way, and i wasn’t really sure of what they were in a lot of cases so it was like this blindly doing things. and just trying to be quite casual about everything. but i would be interested in doing it again, and what doing it again would mean for you, if you felt like something maybe could be done better or if you wanted to work on stuff in a different way, like what you’re thinking about that. i guess i’m interested in it in terms of how you’re going to edit stuff together as well, and how maybe starting and stopping things would happen and how that plays into your editing... cause i think there were times when i would finished doing my little plan, but i knew at the end of it the cameras could still see me and other people were still doing stuff so i was probably going to be in whatever the film, doing not the plan, like doing my own thing, specifically the chess one, there’s a point where there was another bench, and i was like oh well do i sit on this bench or does that mess up that i was just sitting on the bench with louise, and should i wander off in a distance... what’s the best thing for me to be doing now, ectera? its simple stuff like that i guess, really practical stuff i would want to talk about with you. [kim: i mean i knew that the cameras were going to pick up not just character movements, but it was also about the camera people being a part of the scene, cause they were... it

was about the bigger thing, and i was interested in it as a rehearsal, the first time we did it, you know you don’t really know what’s going to happen, and so there was that, a cyclical thing, people got more confident, more comfortable with everything, and so it changed. and so that’s what i was interested in picking up, not just the planned acts. but i would be interested in doing it again, and maybe do more considered shots that are much more based just on the action, not based on the whole set...] yeah yeah, i think right around then as well, was it patrick who was also taking pictures? yeah i started really being aware of him being like kind of intrusive about it. oh it was like, oh wow, okay what am i doing? should i be... is patrick doing a good job? should i go and ask kim what’s going on right now... if she wants me to do any things different? yeah i started thinking about that... oh yeah yeah patrick was really involved in that, he was all over the place. there was definitely filming going on in the filming. [kim: i mean he was really a part of the action. you know this space is really corporate and being the City and everything is always being watched. and so you’re very aware of him recording you. whereas if you’re in that space usually you know there’s these CCTV cameras but you’re much less aware that you’re always on camera. but when there’s a camera in your face that like or always following you around, you feel differently about it.] yeah.

“you’ve got an idea about how you expect the space to be manipulated or what you expect the space will do and that’s something that you can pursue in the sense that you can never anticipate all the eventuality or possibilities of how people will react to that space and use it, although you’re deliberately trying to do that with the design, you can’t ever anticipate everyone’s responses.” paul [crowd] Kim [director] so if we did this again, i don’t know if we’d do it again in the same space or not, but still it would be the idea of playing with the space in a different way so that you are able to use it and think about it differently. i think the props are extremely important, so i would focus more on making sure that everyone had a sound to them because i think that helps people to act it out better, it gave them something to do and something for others to notice. i liked how it was this rehearsal, it was rougher at the beginning and then developed and so people took on their characters. i don’t think, no one there was particularly an actor or taught in how to present themselves, but they all all took on their roles quite well, and part of it had to do with how i cast people into their roles, i knew who would be good where, but i was still also amazed at how they really took

them on, and that was great. i don’t think you need actors, i think you can have regular people who become that mind set, you know. i think it would be a great thing, if you were able to bring in outside participants, that were there, and welcomed other people who were watching, you know, to join in, if it could be a bigger thing like that, because in the end, i think probably the fabric people we had enough of those but the actor participants, there could be more of them, more moving through and making this feel like this kind of loud really well used space for that time, that would be fun to have a lot more people, and to be able to get people from just off the street to be involved. i don’t think it could be any smaller than what we had, because it is such a big massive space you need a large amount there to really make it feel as if something different is happening.

i’d be interested to get the broadgate corporation, to get them involved maybe, to see if they’d be interested in using the space in another way. cause the security guards walking by, since i had the papers and the filming agreement, they didn’t tell us that we couldn’t do anything, even though disregarding all the ‘do not..’ signs, we were going on the grass and climbing all over things, in ways that you know you would be stopped in a second doing on another day, cause they could see everything - i mean i went down to the security room and they have screens of everything that is going on, its crazy. but they were kind of interested, they were like, what are you doing? what was the deal with the green fabric... i think they had a chuckle at least.

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“it is similar to how you learn a new place or a new city, you see it in a different way once you begin to put these stories to it, once you begin to know it better, you experience it differently, from a tourist or the first time you are in a place to months later, years later... you suddenly know these different pieces: you know the coffee shop on that corner or the pub down there or what you talked about with a friend there, you know your way around - and that’s the same thing that we did in a condensed amount of time in the performance, we got to know the space a lot better and now it changes in one’s mind.” kim [director]

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the workbooks >

all the participants were given workbooks with diagrams depicting their movement and actions for each Act and Scene. they were asked to use them to write in, sketch in, record dialogue, anything... as a personal record from their point of view. here’s some.

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act 1 i’m finding the subtleties of my character hard to convey.

-> ZAYNE IS RUBBISH AT THIS [louise, stranger A]

act 2 ‘I’m finding it hard to DRIFT. HOT + windy shy - don’t like jumping. It feels unatural. maybe that’s the point Zayne is writing stuff about me all lies’ [louise]

act 3 Erotic Filmscript 01: Zayne touched my bottle. Then we had a romantic lean over the station. Like a French Film. I said “It’s kind of Romantic.”

He said “yeah” then touched my bottle again. zayne keeps his notebook down his pants.

Fact. [louise]

Act 4 Site of romantic liaison Zayne made a joke Z is getting more distant everyday.

He doesn’t look at me like he used to.

TRAGEDY I can’t put it in words.

Zayne is copying me.

Zayne said I violated his romance. Not sure what that means.

Feel a bit like a toddler. [louise] Very playful - being somebody else Playtime

act 5 We’re changing the rules Kim. I feel like we are really starting to get to know each other. (heart) We sat on the bench It was off plan. But is was nice.

I bumped into Lucy alot.

[THE TODDLER] ZONE EDGE BOUNDARY [WINDY WOMB] [louise]

act 6 I made friends with the crowd.

They were nice.

I miss Zayne.

This is emotional WOMB CLOTH WINDY + cold. in the middle of a big hard macho city.

The row of material worked really well. Cut off bodies, allows for strange interaction. [louise]

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I feel like this is my diary.’

[Zayne, stranger B]

act 3 as you feel your emotions write them down. sitting above the train tracks w/ the trains coming out from between my legs. the arches overlooking the train tracks are made of slats of wood. this is such a good thing to do during this - thing - the writing down of stuff. yeah’ [Zayne, stranger B]

if I was a child I would really want to go on the grass.

I guess the world of corporate architecture is not really built for kids - the google offices are only really childlike - and pixar with their little sheds. maybe there should be climbing frames in each square. as a kid you don’t really want to interact with the architecture its sooo hard. [lucy, child]

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act 4 The space under the armpit of the woman in the middle we’ve ‘discovered’ the location of the European bank for reconstruction and development. i’m amazed that these toilets are open to the public or accessible to the public rather.

I nearly lost my booketlet - But Kim saved it I’m being very serious and acting - (silly!)

I wonder if it looks like these people are distinctively a group coming together we’ve grown distant. It’s sad.

THIS IS A DRAMA. A TRAVESTY. if only I could express the new emotions I’m feeling.

[Zayne, stranger B]

act 5 We’re changing the rules ‘Kim You’re a failure I can’t work w/this.

What do you expect us to do start at two places at once “So unprofessional”’ [zayne]

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filming agreement >

filming on the development of broadgate is only allowed with a legal agreement, which speaks to the area’s privatization. for this performance an agreement was acquired, this allowed the participants freedom to play with the space as they wished, disregarding the usual rules.

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‘thanks thanks thanks to everyone who was a part of this project. it couldn’t have happened without you.’ kim