Jake Oldershaw

Houdini was always at it, Damien Hurst couldn't get enough of it, I might be severely misled but i think DV8 did it and a version of Volpone had it, so why do all artists and performance companies at some stage want to stick things in a tank of water and watch them? If anyone feels like posting a comment i'd be interested to hear about other water based shows, of any scale. Maybe a performers story of how bloody hard it is, any disaster stories due to over ambitious plans, anything really.

My work with other companies invariably ends up with me drenched. Simple Maths and The Carrier Frequency with Stans Cafe; Schrodingers Box with Reckless Sleepers; Take Me To The River with Wendy Houstoun was a stop off on a boat trip on the Thames at Canary Wharf.

The project called SeaHouse with Simon Daw and Alistair Gentry started life as a show on Aldburgh beach during the festival in 2003. It was a great process, sun shining, in a kind of odd plunge pool, seeing how long i could hold my breath...There was a local radio guy came to interview us who couldn't have been more Alan Partridge if he tried - 'But it's not all fun right? There is a serious side?'...I felt like a performing seal, inside the tank, only able to answer questions in sign language.

For images of both version look here - http://www.alistairgentry.demon.co.uk/seahouse.htm

It may not be working but try again, they're good.

Rather than let that event disappear and go the way of all live performance we got together again in 2004 to make a film version. More abstract than the show, much of the filming was done by me holding a heath robinson underwater camera (made from a cctv lense in an ice cream tub). The result is quite a claustrophobic, comic, surreal narrative that if you want to look at it that way discusses the threat of rising sea levels. Post tsunami it took on another set of connotations. Ultimately it's a very nice set of moving pictures to look at for a few minutes.

So it's great that it's going to be shown at the very fine 7inch Cinema club at the Rainbow pub in Digbeth next tuesday.

Click here for their site - http://www.7inch.org.uk

The film has made its way to the Venice Biennale and (pretty disappointing) VAD Festival in Girona last year so it's nice to bring it back. Any ideas for other good film fests to send it to are gratefully accepted.

Posted by Jake at 03:38 PM | Permalink

This is quite advance warning but stick it in the diary now. After a scratch 'performance lecture' at Battersea in January the finished product will return on May 16th - 17th during Burst festival.

Over the last few years I've been on a personal quest, travelling around Birmingham meeting residents of Britain’s most landlocked city who keep images of the sea on their walls.
Combining portrait photography, recorded conversations and a bit of end of the pier charm this touching show will pick you up like a good sea breeze.

Here are some comments from folk who saw the scratch night (no they're not written by mates)

'I really enjoyed your show! You are a very warm, enagaging performer'

'I thought your show was briliiant - brilliant! Seriously, what a great brain child it was. So inspiring, positive, beautiful, there should be more stuff like it out there.'

Bear in mind I could be doing this for the love only if i don't get a grant...So cough up!

The new version is likely to feature some good old folky numbers (and me singing) depending on which musician i can persuade to do it - unfortunately the wonderful Alfredo Genovesi will be indisposed.

So there, you read it here, no excuse not to come now is there?

Posted by Jake at 12:04 PM | Permalink

The bells are still ringing...It's monday afternoon, nearly 2 days since the carnage that was Gogol Bordello's last live uk date in Manchester, and i can't hear properly! If i hadn't enjoyed it so much i'd sue!

The whole experience was extra special having got on a mission after trying to get into the Astoria show in London the night before only to be scuppered by touts wanting 40 quid a ticket. It was midday in Stoke Newington and after a few weeks of trying to get to see the original gypsy punks before they head back to the US it had come down to this. Leave town now and you might just get in. Trains, cars, buses, boats, everything except the planes; must be needing some kind of quest to follow at the moment.

And aye carumba did it pay off! Everything you could ask for - 2 hours of pogo mosh in a ukranian new york style! At one stage having dragged two ageing punks off the floor one turned to say 'I'm getting too old for this'. That's how much energy they put out.

It's great to see a shit kicking band with a blatantly political agenda coming out of the states. You can't help wondering whether it confirms the old 'art from extremes' theory. Such an extreme state america has found itself in there can only be more cultural backlashes like this. Not that they're directly commenting about America - the issues Gogol Bordello talk about are universal. But my god they know how to party. Hopa! Look them up at http://www.gogolbordello.com

Posted by Jake at 12:52 PM | Permalink

OK so regular diary writing was never my strong point. Been a while since the last episode, water under the bridge and all that.

I'm just about adjusting back to Brit time after the Spain Rice trip. I may as well get the insulting stereotype out of the way but my god there's a lot of pig to be eaten out there! Its almost impossible to resist the urge to gnaw on the leg of something.

The first outing for the Europe version of 'Of All The People In All The World' was presented in two brilliant spaces in Madrid and Valencia - A train station hanger and a converted rice grain store. The industrial origins really lend themselves to the aesthetic of the show but were unfortunately in quite inaccesible part of town so visitor numbers were pretty poor - A complete contrast to Manchester Art Gallery where we've just spent four days in an atrium space between galleries. Normally just to get from a to b but completely transformed and enlivened by the show. It's great to see how people who are trying to walk by and ignore the wierd people in the corner catch sight of a few statistics and get hooked in.

How shows like this are billed and placed is all important. On the one hand it's obviously a real treat to feel like the international artiste, transforming vast industrial landscapes and defining the event as a performance experience. But there's a whole lot to be said for grabbing the attention of people who have no idea what the thing is, that it is even an art event. Preconceptions of conceptual or performance art as impenetrable and high brow can really get in the way. Sometimes my response to people who come up during the day and say 'is this supposed to be art then?' is not to even worry about that. Just have a look at it. It's such a simple idea anyone from 5 to 90 can grasp the concept and appreciate it. But until you see it for some reason a lot of people don't actually understand what it is. So when you struggle with getting audience there in the first place it can be a slightly frustrating process. Of course maybe the spanish don't really care about statistics...quizas quizas, who needs to be sure, who needs the facts?!

One of the funniest surrealist nights i've ever had on the last night in Madrid - really a great city, much more exciting for me than Valencia or Barcelona. Bit of a bore describing a big night out but here it is.

We packed up the show - Went for food at one of our local performers dads restaurant. (it's one of the great things about the show that you get to work like that) Boca Del Lobo, go there, it's fantastic food and laid back. Tried to get into the festival club who said they don't let anyone from the festival in, not after last year! A nasty overcrowded trendy bar then a party in a bancrupt toy shop on the Gran Via. It was pretty much winding down when we arrived but ended up with toy sheep racing, a shit toy lucky dip, and bad drunken face painting. Funny, now it's written down it all seems a bit lame but we had a blast. With terrible DIY clown faces and lovely kitsch gifts we left there at 6ish and got a drink in 'Heavenly Temptation' - a goth club that we happened to pass and was open. You've got to worry a bit when heavily adorned Goths start looking at you like you're the freak! That closed up and we passed the tapas bar which had become our local and there was a queue to get in! 7 in the morning and it was busier than we'd ever seen it. Still with the bad, smudged face paint, like a casualty from a Forced Entertainment 24 hour show, the light starting to change, watching a plastic ballerina dancing with her hero on a magnetic toy stage.

Posted by Jake at 11:48 AM | Permalink