the playground

Blog entry Thursday, April 14, 2005

warm sea

Thanks to all who were present last Sunday for The Playground. It created clashing, imaginative, ongoing spaces... happening together. A very real space. In terms of achieving what it says above in the Field blurb, it was wholly successful. I can't really say more than what has been written below by a member of the 'audience', which of course there wasn't:

"I wanted to give you feedback on this afternoons happening.

I was very relieved when you said that the kids could come along. As a parents, one becomes adept at hiding behind the children at times one finds difficult oneself.

Ha!

How extraordinary to find myself in a holding environment that I was free to play in. No worries about observation or play types or hazards or staff needs. You took care of it all. For the first time in decades I was able to play for me. I suspect that even those of you who were 'performing' lost that agenda at times. There was no need for performance because, through your creation of the potential space and the shared holding of it, we were able to see the beauty of us all when we open up to playing.

It was messy and simple and complex and touching. I remember dismissing a playcue from someone I did not know because I had my play agenda that was too important for me to compromise, even to be polite.

I keep coming back to the image of swimming in a warm sea, without having to worry about the safety of my children or concerning myself with their exploration. I have only a vague memory of this carefreeness.

I suppose that what I want to say is that I feel replenished.

What you have created is something very powerful.

I am so reluctant to see it stop there.

Z, who is not a playworker, but is studying children playspaces, said to me, 'It took me right back to playing in the country side in Greece with my cousins. It was beautiful.'

Thank you for letting me experience what I have been doing."

Thanks to everyone who came and all who 'performed' to create whatever it was that happened.

The space discussion continues on the 8th May, for the last Field of the current series, when we are pleased to welcome Doreen Massey, head of geography at the Open University and author of 'For Space' (Sage 2005). Doreen has been an invaluable source of inspiration recently.

Other references/models, if you're interested, include (amongst others) Augusto Boal, the Mono-Ha, DW Winnicott, John Berger and of course the playground.

Blog entry Wednesday, May 04, 2005

For Space

Above are some images from the previous Field event - "the playground". The next Field - the last in the current series - takes place Sunday 8th May

6 pm

Chisenhale Dance Space

with

scopac

pam gilmore

rachel cockburn

jane munro

kristi harris

matt davis

doreen massey

simon hyde

april nunes

"Field continues its discussion of space and invites you to enter a potential space where you can explore, play or just simply be. Explore an open space of crossing trajectories, simultaneous stories and infinite possibilities. A space of several 'performances' happening at once - separately and not separately. Things meet, clash, collide, correspond, merge and disperse.

We are pleased to welcome for this event - the last in the current series - Doreen Massey. Doreen is head of geography at the Open University and author of the recently published 'For Space' (Sage 2005).

Doreen has written about space as a multiplicity - a contemporaneous plurality,

- as always under construction, never closed.

- and that by equating representation with spatialisation we take the life out of space."