Alice Will Caroline
Photos by Bryony Jackson
photo: Mischa Baka
photo: Bryony Jackson
Lady Example
May 2018
Next Wave Festival
Presented by the Substation and Next Wave
March 2019
DANCEMASSIVE
Presented by Arts House
An intentionally undefined, expansive horde of stimulus is ground down, knitted into a fine weave, over a slow process guided strongly by our intuition, and our personal baggage. We offer up a semiotic field for our audiences to wander through, undertaking your own journeys of recognition and confusion, completing the work with your own subconscious.
We describe LADY EXAMPLE as ‘a dance of bodies, words and women.’ We choreograph the moving, interacting body, as well as language, theatre, reference and design. From within the broad theme of ‘women,’ we found patterns emerging around performativity, role playing, teaching and learning, inherited behaviour and expectations. Our ‘libretto’ is drawn from a bank of miscellaneous language artefacts, gathered over four years, then mashed up and merged with the dance. The resulting “denatured language” (Alison Croggon) toys with recognition, and what to make of it is ultimately up to you (Personal responsibility, honey).
"...a phenomenal show that works even though, by all means, it should collapse under its own towering ambitions."
Jana Perkovic, The Age
"Lady Example is a bewildering bricolage of behaviours and performances, knitted together with total assurance. You feel that it ought to crumble beneath the weight of its own spiralling aspirations. Instead, I found myself enthralled by a precision of judgement and execution that draws together this unclassifiable work into a fascinating unity."
Alison Croggon, Witness Performance
Choreography, Performance and Direction
ALICE DIXON, CAROLINE MEADEN, WILLIAM MCBRIDE
Performance
BEN HURLEY, FLEUR CONLON, JOANNE WHITE, HANNAH MONSON, LUKE FRYER, PATRICK DURNAN-SILVA, EMMA RICHES, SCOTT ELSTERMANN
Lighting
JASON CRICK (Next Wave), JEN HECTOR (DANCEMASSIVE)
Costumes and Set
MATILDA WOODROOFE
Sound
EMAH FOX
Producer
ERIN MILNE (BUREAU OF WORKS)
Awards
Nominee: Green Room Award for Best Ensemble (Dance)
Nominee: Green Room Award for Best Production
Nominee: Green Room Award for Sound Composition (Emah Fox)
Nominee: Green Room Award for Best Performer (Caroline Meaden)
Dance Massive season filmed by Takeshi Kondo
Next Wave season filmed by Mischa Baka
Lady Example's development and presentation was made possible with support from the Besen Family Foundation, Creative Victoria, the Australia Council for the Arts, City of Melbourne, Creative Partnerships Australia, City of Maribyrnong, Vitalstatistix, the Substation, Next Wave, Arts House and numerous individual donors.