It’s almost the winter break, and this session was the very last one for now. We imagined a fire inside of us, representing our inner strength, energy and resilience. We also imagined a bonfire, around which all of us could sit and share songs and stories. Even when we can’t be together physically, the virtual community continues providing solace and resilience. Enjoy our vocalisations, and happy holidays everyone!

Guy Harries, who has devised and run our workshops, recently shared the underlying ideas and methodology guiding his teaching and facilitation techniques at a conference titled Dance AND Research at the national dance academy in Rome. Examples Guy mentioned included not only the Red Hat Opera workshops, but also a participatory public project at Tate Modern (run in collaboration with Simonetta Alessandri and Trinity Laban Conservatoire) and a performance devised with postgraduate students from the Accademia Nazionale di Danza which was performed at MACRO Museum in Rome. The paper was developed further and published in a collection of articles.

If you are curious to read more, a pre-publication version of Guy’s paper is available through this link. https://repository.uel.ac.uk/item/87y0x

Images – copyright Accademia Nazionale di Danza, Rome, IT

Summer has arrived, and we’re still online, making sure everyone keeps safe. We have decided to work on a longer piece over several months, with the aim to create a video opera about our experience during this strange time.

Each member of the group created a character, represented in colours and shapes. Following this, we also created masks to wear in the opera video, and explored vocal traits and relationships between the characters.

We look forward to sharing the video opera with you in the coming months. In the meantime, enjoy a sneak peek of our masks (still work in progress!) as well as some vocal improvisation.

During this strange time, we are all the more aware of how we wish to connect with others. Working with the image of a web, we imagine the group as connected, with each one of us on a node of a community in flux.

With spring in the air, this week in our online workshop we connected with the idea of a garden. As an image, we imagined how we are taking care of our inner garden. What is growing in it? What is flourishing? How are we taking care of our garden, and in a sense – ourselves. We explored this in movement, words and vocalisation, thinking about the overall structure of the garden, as well as its intricate, minute details.

This is a very emotional time for all of us, so this session’s aim was to connect us all through the heart. The heart as a source of energy and connection with the whole body. The heart as a symbolic seat of our feelings. We drew, wrote and vocalised as a group, connecting with each other’s heartbeat.

During this lockdown, we are closed in our individual spaces. Can we start imagining how we are growing, developing, hoping, transforming into something new? We worked with the idea of a cocoon, sheltered and growing, with a future ahead of turning into a beautiful butterfly, flying freely in the world. Drawing, movement, words and voices fluttered through the session! Here are some drawings and words from the members of the group.

Lockdown is here, with all its overwhelming implications and uncertainties. One consolation is the stability of the sun, rising every morning. Spring is here, and the appearance of the sun is giving us some hope in the midst of it all. Our online session was a meditation on the sun, its comforting warmth as well as its destructive potential. Here are some drawings, vocalisations and a poem created at the session.

All Are One

Sunlight 

Life-light

Growth-light 

Love-light 

Air-light 

Sun -energy 

Life – energy 

Growth-energy 

Love -energy 

Air -energy 

All connect 

All are one