Sebastian Marmite, the bedsit aesthete, walked the Spiegeltent runway for Brighton Big Drag Pageant at Brighton Fringe! Beautiful portrait by Jack Ball.
Sebastian Marmite at Brighton Big Drag Pageant at the Spiegeltent!
Trailer for ‘Judy Speaks’ by Grégoire Aubert
I filmed and edited the trailer for Grégoire Aubert’s solo theatre show ‘Judy speaks’, based on the infamous confessional tapes Judy Garland recorded between 1961 and 1966.
Trailer for ‘Judy Speaks’ by Gregoire Aubert (short version) from Melanie Menard on Vimeo.
FEAT group exhibition – Rottingdean Windmill – 3-18 May
4 Photographs from the Ghost House series displayed inside Rottingdean Windmill, as part of the ‘Future Evolutionary Arts Turbine’ exhibition.
Weekends 3-4 10-11 17-18 May, 12 noon – 4.30pm
Private view on Friday 2 May, 6-9 pm, contact me for an invite. I’ll also be invigilating on Sunday 18th if you want to have a chat.
Rottingdean Windmill, Beacon Hill, A 259 Coast Road
Buses: 12, 12a, 14 & 27
Free entry
Press Release
F.E.A.T is an art/heritage organisation showcasing 14 contemporary artist’s work at Rottingdean Windmill to coincide with Brighton Fringe Festival. It promises a dynamic show of innovative ideas and artwork in an inspiring and challenging space. We are presenting a diverse range of mediums including, photography, painting, audio and visual works, sculpture, installation art, ceramics, embroidery, screenprinting and an exterior installation outside the mill.
F.E.A.T supports emerging and established artists in a unique site in a Grade II listed windmill, maintained by Rottingdean Preservation Society. The windmill is a black smock mill situated on Beacon Hill on the Brighton to Newhaven A259 coast road. It was erected in 1802 and the last miller finished work here in the early 1880’s. It was saved from demolition by the Marquis of Abergavenny who had the mill renovated in 1905.
Accompanying the exhibition are a number of events; a Windmill talk, Walk & Talk of Rottingdean and a performance by musicians Annie Kerr and Chris Parfitt See website for details.
Contact details: feat2012@hotmail.co.uk
Exhibiting artists: Christine Barnes, Rachel Cohen, Gen Doy, Jaime Etherington, Jim Foster, Jill Guillais, Melanie Menard, Matt Niblett, Kate Orton, Agata Read,
Sujo Remi, Julia Rowe, Helena Tett and Sandra Wright.
For further details:
Website: http://feat09.wix.com/feat09
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/feat09
Twitter: https://twitter.com/feat09
Background video projections for Ken Mc Loone’s ‘In Capacity House’ show at Regency Tavern
I made the background video projections for Ken Mc Loone’s ‘In Capacity House’ show, after falling in love as a spectator with an earlier version of the show last year. You can catch the last run of the show on 16, 17, 18 May, 7.30 pm at the Regency Tavern, Brighton. This is the story of Miss Diagnosis, ‘alternative Glaswegian drag artist’, as she mourns her dreams of glory and rants at the people who destroyed them in the confines of her tiny studio flat… Bittersweet, poignant and full of dark humor…
This show bravely lays bare the inner workings of the human mind that we usually feel more comfortable ignoring. According to Ken, the writer/performer, the main theme is mental illness, but I believe it goes further: it is about everyday neurosis. Miss Diagnosis lies to herself and blames the whole world for her own shortcomings, but she is never presented as a freak, or someone to laugh at. Her story is told with empathy, through simple childhood memories and everyday moments everyone can empathize with. Deep, uncomfortable themes such as alienation and loneliness are treated with subtlety and a total lack of pretention: no big words or patronizing ‘messages’, just the raw portrayal of an ordinary individual’s lost hopes and coping mechanisms. We cannot help but recognize bits of Miss Diagnosis in ourselves: her self-delusions, her grandiose belief in her own superiority, her blaming others make us laugh, but a deeply uncomfortable laugh because we are forced to face that we react the same way on a daily basis, albeit in a less extreme manner.
If you want just another entertaining drag show, or ‘safe’ drama that reassuringly simplifies the world for you, that shows you characters with 3 easily identified goals and conflicts, and a linear plot ending in a moral and ‘worthy’ resolution, then this is probably not the show for you. If you are ready to be challenged, to sit for an hour in front of a mirror reflecting the less glorious parts of the human psyche, if you love the plays of Beckett or the films of Polanski, David Lynch, Neil Jordan, then go see it, there is nothing else quite like it at the Fringe.
As a teaser, the video I shot of Donald (Miss Diagnosis)’s mother talking to him. The performer says his part of the dialogue in real time, interacting with his memory of his mother.
mother at sink from Ken McLoone on Vimeo.
And his parents arguing (no live interacting with the memory on screen this time):