2023

 
They Danced As One 2023-

42 minutes

Cinematography & Editor: Helena Öhman

Sound Design: Rob Bentall (to be produced)

In 2019 the surviving Tiller Girls, representing many different generations of dancers, met up for a reunion in Blackpool—a key home of the troupe. I went along with Helena Öhman, to record the event and talk to the women.

The footage of the event shows glamorous older women, posing, chatting, laughing, negotiating one another, reliving memories, and showing me how to link arms as a Tiller Girl.

Interposed text highlights speech, emphasising the insights and opinions that develop and challenge earlier video works. Black and white archival footage of filmed theatre performances depict Tiller Girl dances giving visual descriptions to pair with the stories.

2021

 
Still from Modernity / Power
Video, 12.50 mins
Made from appropriated backstage musical Hollywood films made between 1929 and 1940, Modernity / Power reframes latent power dynamics on the screen through text interventions and foley sound–clips, clicks, clapping, tap-dancing, and breathing. These disruptions draw attention to the labour of the bodies performing and their incredible skills.

Pose and Shadow, Alexandra Danilova
Watercolour on A4 watercolour (300gsm) paper (210 x 297 mm)

2011

 
Scene 4 web
Gaga Charleston, 2011 
Video, 4 mins 7 secs

The final ‘letter’ I sent to Kerstin Honeit, as part of our video dialogue ‘Video Letters‘.  This later became Scene 4 of the ‘The Artist’, a collection of five videos dancing in my studio.

2018

 
Felicity Means Happiness, 2018
Video, 16 mins

The story of a 98-year old former chorus girl. In the thirties, Felicity was a Bluebell Young Lady. She toured France, Germany, and Italy until WW2 was declared in Italy. Felicity Means Happiness shows Felicity, telling her stories, and Carr showing Felicity her artworks inspired by 1930s dancers, and footage of an Austrian film Felicity was in. What is conveyed is the connection between the two women as well as the realities of dancing and living independently in the thirties.
Bauhaus Bühnenchor, 2018
Performance, 35 mins
Construction House, S1 Artspace

Choreography by Lucy Haighton
Scarf design by Katy Aston / Fison Zair
Performers: Celia Anderson, Julia Bisby, Jo Dunkly, Liz Searle, Emily Stokes, and Roanna Wells.

Bauhaus Bühnenchor is a live performance that experiments with the girl troupe kickline. Using the kickline as a form with the potential to represent women’s collective and creative force Bauhaus Bühnenchor imagines the experiences of Weimarian female art students and chorus girls as well considering the context of dancing in a troupe today. 

2013

 
Scene 3, 2013
Video, 3 mins 50 secs

May 012014
 

I instigated a video show collaboratively curated with Megan Cotts, Alexis Hudgins, Ali Prosch & Brica Wilcox shown at SIA Gallery in May.  The show featured ten video works by Alison J Carr, Alexis Hudgins, Ivan Iannoli, Julie Orser & Jon Irving, Ali Prosch, Elleni Sclaventis, Matt Siegle, amy von harrington, Brica Wilcox, that respond to the provocation of Hollywood Forever: the dream, the film industry, the cemetery on Santa Monica Boulevard.  Each takes a different approach to Hollywood—from considering the myth, the geography, the surplus of images it gives us, the imperative to perform, the seduction and the make-believe.

More information about the project Hollywood Forever Bios.

image credit Julie Orser & Jon Irving, from The Viewer

Julie_Orser_Jon_Irving_005

Feb 182014
 

I’ve put together a selection of videos to be screened at S1 Artspace, Thu 20 Feb, 6 – 8pm:

Alison J Carr | Lindsay Foster | Alexis Hudgins | Stephanie Owens | Isabella Streffen | Katy Woods

S1 Artspace is pleased to present You Me You Me You Me, a screening of six short video works which will be followed by a discussion between artists Alison J Carr and Lindsay Foster.

In this screening, S1 Studio Holder, Alison J Carr, selected Lindsay Foster’s The Last Frontier as a starting point alongside which she presents four additional works: Notes on You and Me by Alexis Hudgins, The Pulse of Madame K by Isabella Streffen, Nadia by Katy Woods, and her own A Response to Unmastered by Katherine Angel; inviting Foster to select a final piece to sit alongside her own: Making A Past Present by Stephanie Owens.

The videos take different approaches to reflect on personal experiences and collective memories, on images and language and how we find ourselves formed through our encounters with culture. Across the selection are witty, playful observations as well as sincere enquiries. What is it to be a person?

 

Alexis Hudgins, Notes on You and Me, 2010
Alexis Hudgins, Notes on You & Me, 2010