EVENINGS IN RESIDENCE:
Natalie Abbott

Evenings In Residence promises to be a highlight of our public engagement program as the 12 Australian Residency Artists working and living at the Pier offer insights into their concerns and responses to Marina Abramović: In Residence.

5-7pm: EVENING IN RESIDENCE WITH NATALIE ABBOTT

Natalie Abbott presents an evening of screenings, sound workshops, discussion and live performance. She begins this exploration of ideas of physical limits, responses to violence and pain, and the interplay of sound and movement as choreographic tools in performance, with an excerpt from the atmospheric feature film Berberian Sound Studio. A screening from her 2014 work MAXIMUM is followed by a discussion on physical failure, and a unique live performance, revealing the experiments in sound and movement that Natalie is exploring at the residency. Audience members have the chance to participate!

• Berberian Sound Studio, 2012 (94 mins)
  An evocative celebration and delicious deconstruction of the Italian horror genre, full of sly references and a brilliant soundtrack by Broadcast.
  Written and directed by Peter Strickland; produced by Keith Griffiths and Mary Burke. Courtesy of Warp Films
• Natalie Abbott, MAXIMUM, 2014 (excerpt). Courtesy of the artist

 

Natalie Abbott creates sensory performance experiences. She is committed to the idea that everything is choreography, including light, sound, movement and design, and she utilises this vision when devising work. Abbott has been making her own work; touring throughout Europe, Asia and America; and working with independent choreographers and visual artists in Melbourne, the United Kingdom and New York. Natalie is a collaborator for the DEEP SOULFUL SWEATS (fantasy light yoga project) at CHUNKY MOVE, and has recently been invited to FOLA and Next Wave Festival opening party, 2014. She recently spoke alongside Stelarc on a panel ART and the BODY at the Wheeler Centre for Ideas for the Festival of Live Art in Melbourne.

Natalie aims to work through the concept of failure throughout the residency, using repetitive movement and vocal exercises to investigate a new physicality reached through exhaustion. She is intrigued by moments where failure generates honest problem solving within a performance, generating a kind of ‘authenticity’. Natalie is also interested in experimenting with the relationship between light and sound through choreography in the absence of the performer throughout the program.

Above right: Natalie Abbott, MAXIMUM, 2014. Photo: Gregory Lorenzutti