The Thousands

Perth is a city full of wonderful and exciting things, but it is rarely a city that can claim a ‘first’. Until now! Now we have the best ‘first’ ever: Australia’s first micro-festival of one-on-one art, aka Proximity. Put that in your cool pipe and smoke it you new wave everything east coasters!

What happens in Proximity is this: 12 independent theatre, dance and live artists from WA have each custom made a performance for you. Well, they don’t know you yet, but they do want to get very intimate with you! In the bathroom, in the kitchen, on the desk, in the hallway (mental note: food, trike bikes, tap shoes and/or beards may be involved). This show requires audience members to give as good as the performance they’re getting.

Perth artist Renae Coles self-admittedly pursues projects that are ‘poetic and ridiculous’. She is a co-curator of The Conservatorium (also showing during Fringe World), a member of the Spatula Collective, and has had a residency at PICA. As a Proximity performer (her piece is called ‘The Union’) she can also illuminate the concepts and experiences of Proximity in a much more proficient manner than we can.

Danielle Marsland: What do you think the intimate performance experiences in Proximity can offer to people?
Renae Coles: Each performance is so different, so unique. A lot of them have a participatory element, which is interesting, because usually for an audience member to participate in a performance they have to be humiliated or dragged up the front. There’s none of that in Proxmity because there is no other audience – it’s just the two of you. Even the ones where you don’t participate and you just watch, it’s still a performance just for you, which is a really beautiful gift.

DM: What are the logistics behind attending Proximity as an audience member? Does each ticketholder get to see lots of performances?
RC: There are a few options – the 12 performances are split into three programs. Each performance in each program is only 12 minutes each, so if you buy a ticket to at least one program you will see four shows in an hour, or you can do a marathon and see all three program.

DM: You’ve already had a couple of test runs – what has the response to the work been like?
RC: I’ve personally had an overwhelmingly enthusiastic experience. I wasn’t sure how many people would be willing to engage and open up their experiences to me. But so far I’ve had 100% of people getting into it, getting excited and having fun.

DM: So it’s a reciprocal thing at its best – the audience member needs to put in a bit of effort?
RC: It’s exciting and crazy for the audience! Our production team have been amazing, they made little maps for each audience member. So you’ve got 12 audience members running all over the Blue Room trying to find these strange, tucked away performance venues!

DM: How did you come to be involved in Proximity? I understand it was a workshop process?
RC: I missed the workshop because I was away, but I was really interested by the concept. I put in a written application, 20 people were shortlisted, we gave a showing of the work in progress, and from there 12 works were selected. I’ve had the core idea for a few years and was just waiting for a format where it could be realised. When Proximity came along, it was a perfect fit.

DM: How involved were Proximity’s creators -  Sarah Rowbottom, James Berlyn and Kelli Mccluskey – in developing your performances?
RC: Kelli has been amazing – her role is provocateur, so she’s been dropping in on all of us while we’ve been rehearsing, and just picking up on points where she thinks we can take it further. She has a real eye for seeing where a work could be extended and fully realised. And we each had a mentor – I was with Sarah, who was also really great.

DM: Your piece for Proximity, ‘The Union’, constructs an imagined space for voicing small injustices – how did you arrive at the idea for the piece?
RC: It started through talking to friends. I found that everyone can get really passionate about small injustices. Like getting a parking fine when you really shouldn’t have, because the signage didn’t make sense. That kind of thing, when you thought you were in the right, so you write letters to the council, but you just can’t get any further without going to court, which costs a lot of money.

People get really fired up about this stuff, which I love. I also love when people take them on, and don’t just go ‘oh, whatever, it’s just the system’. I thought maybe for the people who don’t have the time or the means to make up for small injustices, maybe if there was a collective of people who could get involved. Then I thought the perfect medium for responding to things that can’t be resolved in any other way is punk music – it’s aggressive, it’s raw, you don’t need to have any talent – you just belt it out.

DM: Do you play in a punk band yourself? What is your personal connection to the piece?
RC: I don’t actually, but I’ve always wanted to be in a band. The main connection I have with the piece is that I’ve worked in customer service since I was 17. The role I play in the work is of Membership Officer for the Union, so I play a sweet, informed, chatty officer who fills out forms and acts professional, then I sort of change into this punk character and help people pick strong words to describe their injustice. I help them to select the key words for the lyrics, then we make a chorus and sing it out loud, see what’s missing, and add some F-bombs or something (laughs).

DM: And then the songs get passed onto a punk band, comprised of local musicians?
RC: Yes, six works of the twelve we do each day are selected to be recorded each week. The recordings will then be sent to the participants and will also be put on a website. The band has been formed by musicians all over Perth – I basically just did some callouts that said ‘musicians needed for punk band – no real talent necessary’ (laughs). I have a lot of faith in these guys, I think as long as its aggressive and loud we can’t go wrong!

DM: What kind of injustices have been aired so far?
RC: A broad range of things! One was about buying/having an intense craving for chocolate – the person bought a chocolate bar recommended by the sales person, only to discover it was awful and melted throughout! Then this other lady said peaches were one of her top five foods, but she bought her first bag of the season from IGA, and they went rotten after a day. She felt that was a travesty and was really hurt.

DM: Can you tell us about another of your favourite pieces in Proximity?
RC: I haven’t experienced it myself, but Janet Carter is doing a strip poker piece – she comes from a live art background like me. Her piece is structured around strip poker – people are asked to come in and take off their shoes, then she teaches them a simple style of poker. Every time someone loses they take something off. People have varying levels of comfort with that, so that’s the entry point Janet uses to talk to them and get to know them, you know, because she herself has lots of insecurities. It’s a personal, intimate piece that’s very playful. I heard yesterday that Jonathan Holloway [Perth Festival’s Artistic Director] played a game with Janet!

DM: What a dude! What has been the most rewarding thing so far about working on Proximity?
RC: Yesterday I had four people say “thanks so much for what you’re doing with The Union, you guys are doing a really great job”. That was a highlight.