The Centre for the Less Good Idea is an interdisciplinary incubator space for the arts based in Maboneng, Johannesburg

 PERFORMING THE OBJECT | PROPS, PUPPETS & MASKS

How can a cardboard box transform into a mask or a character when worn by a performer? What kind of quality or tension can an inanimate object on stage bring to a performance? And how does this change once the object is activated by the performer?

From 26 to 28 July 2022, SO | The Academy for the Less Good Idea hosted a mentorship with William Kentridge titled Performing the Object: Props, puppets & masks. Taking place at The Centre for the Less Good Idea, the mentorship saw 15 participants who work across the realms of visual art and performance, exploring the performative possibilities of the object on stage.

During this mentorship, participants investigated, among other things, the relationship between the object, what the actor can do with it and what the object demands. Over the course of three days, explorations into inadvertent masks, the anxious object, costume as character, predictable and inappropriate sound, the speed of an object and its plea for stillness, the miniature and the gigantic, the grammar of the object, and the object as heroine were all unpacked, tested and played with on stage.

While there was no expectation to produce or perform finished plays or ideas, a number of short-form, experimental performances emerged from the mentorship. Some of these ideas may develop and take on different shapes outside of The Centre, while others may remain once-off experiments on stage. All of them, though, serve the purpose of exploring and experimenting with the notion of performing the object.

WAYS OF THINKING

What are the ways in which an inanimate object can come to hold active emotions and states of being on stage? Can an item as ordinary as a cardboard box serve as an inadvertent, yet convincing mask for a performer? Through exploring the relationship between performer and object, the Performing the Object: props, puppets & masks mentorship sought to better understand the performative possibilities of the object as well as costume, movement and sound on stage. 

Led by draughtsman, performer, filmmaker and co-founder of The Centre for the Less Good Idea, William Kentridge, the three-day mentorship prompted play, collaboration and the pursuit of that which is secondary, resulting in a series of scratch performances centred around the use of the prop, the costume or the object on stage.

Locating tension as an introduction to movement on stage

“So, the art is in the gear change. It’s about holding the level of tension and then finding the motivation to change it.” – William Kentridge   

Prior to any interaction with objects or props on stage, participants were led by Kentridge through a basic exercise designed to familiarise themselves with the levels of tension in the body and the ways in which this influences movement on stage.

From level 1, a sleepy, “zombie-like” state of movement, through to the active and energetic state of level 5, the exercise is about very specific states of tension and energy on stage and the different performative or gestural qualities this imparts.

Each day saw participants repeating this exercise, recalling and implementing it on stage through various showings and explorations, as well as through the development of the exercise itself. Levels of tension were also explored through material environments and states – honey, clay, steel and water – and the act of embodying these.

Altogether, these exercises in tension gave way to a series of moments that were carried through to the stage – the relationship between two actors (or an actor and an object) with different levels of tension, for example, and the shifting dynamics that emerge once one of them changes levels.

In this way, the exercise demonstrated clear developments over the course of the mentorship, and continued to emerge through the improvisations and showings of work.

Sound as language and communication

Sound, be it music and melody or noise and cacophony, played a vital role. From the warm-ups and the ideation sessions to the showings on stage, sound became a means of communication, rhythm, atmosphere and more. Specifically, it was the live music percussion – something of responsive soundscape – of visual artist and percussionist Daniel ‘Stompie’ Selibe that lent a generative quality to the process.

Participants were also led through exercises that made use of sound and atypical language as the central provocations. The challenge of translating a thought into a sound allowed for the development of a simple and economically told narrative, while a conversation held only by numbers, sounds or random words yielded productive moments of communication through mistranslation.

As with the exercises in tension, these moments allowed participants to adopt a more intuitive mode of performance, identifying the gaps or the needs of their fellow performers in a conversation and resolving them accordingly.   

Observing the object

“The real work, I think, will be in the observation of the objects and one’s interactions with them. Everybody will be doing things on stage, but the key work will be done by those not on stage, watching.” – William Kentridge.

Objects, naturally, were central to the explorations of the mentorship. Throughout the three days, various objects and materials – cardboard, paper, ink, tape, branches and bananas – were made available to participants. These materials were used as characters, props, costumes and more. As Kentridge explains, it is in the observation of the object – by the audience and the actor alike – that an entire performance can be held.

Over the course of the mentorship, participants explored objects in a variety of ways. There was the object that refused to be moved, the object that insisted on being listened to, and the ever-present anxious object: a banana peel waiting to be slipped on, a saucer perched precariously on the edge of a table, or a rattling cupboard full of voices. While the significance of the object varied across the performances, the actor’s interaction with it – their ability to communicate with or through the object, or to convey a clear sense of tension or emotion with the object – was where the real generative moments of the mentorship emerged. These discoveries also served as the basis for short-form explorations that were explored over the three days.  

By way of practical demonstration, participants were invited to The Linder Auditorium to witness a rehearsal performance of Kentridge’s film Oh to Believe in Another World, accompanied by Shostakovich’s Symphony No. 10 and performed by the Mzansi National Philharmonic Orchestra. Filmed inside of a series of cardboard models with miniature props, the film also incorporated performers who made use of cardboard cut-out masks to transform, simply and convincingly, into the characters they were playing. This action of using the cardboard mask as both a prop and a narrative device, as well as the way in which the physical performance of the actors became a tool for communication, were themes that resonated throughout.

Two-minute epics

While there was no expectation to perform or test the outcomes of the mentorship, publicly, the generation of new material for performance on stage is a natural outcome of the process of discovering new ways of performing the object. Given both the timeframe of the mentorship and the use of the short-form as a vital tool for thinking by The Centre, Kentridge gave the participants the task of developing a two-minute epic.

These two-minute epics needed only to convey a clear and concise narrative using an object and performance on stage. The results were hugely generative. About 15 short-form performances were developed over the three days, all of them employing the tools, exercises and explorations that emerged through the process.

Performances ranged from the simple act of eating yoghurt on stage, to moments of high-drama, tension and comedy as a result of a suspicious banana peel. Here, once more,  key moments of insight and productivity came from the act of observation – of watching an object being performed on-stage and identifying the sparks, the mistakes, the moments worth pursuing and expanding upon.

Additionally, evident in the diversity of the works developed and shown is a key sentiment by Kentridge and one that resonated throughout the mentorship: The real work of the performer lies in their ability to believe in the object.

— David Mann

CREDITS:

William Kentridge is the co-founder of The Centre for the Less Good Idea and is internationally acclaimed for his drawings, films, theatre and opera productions. Kentridge's method combines drawing, writing, film, performance, music, theatre, and collaborative practices to create works of art that are grounded in politics, science, literature and history, yet maintaining a space for contradiction and uncertainty.

The participants of the Performing the Object: props, puppets & masks mentorship were Richard ‘Specs’ Ndimande, Natalie Paneng, Nthabiseng Malaka, Teresa Phuti Mojela, Qondiswa James, Yonela Makoba, Calvin Ratladi, Bongile Gorata Lecoge-Zulu, Nava Derakshani, Indalo Stofile, Daniel ‘Stompie’ Selibe, Masesi Hlatshwayo, Jeremy Nedd, Sboniso Thombeni & Gabriel Marchand.

Athena Mazarakis is the Momenteur for the SO Academy