LIFE IN LOCKDOWN: TUESDAY.
Life in Lockdown is a blog series initiated by Greenwich Dance which features community and professional artists close to the organisation sharing how they are staying creative during these isolating times.
John Darvell – Director, Choreographer, Educationalist and Community Dance Practitioner
TUESDAY.
6:00 am and sleepy-eyed. I grab Wilson, the freshly recharged batteries and not forgetting that last-minute late-night scribbled note. Yes, an early start again in the garage, as first thing are the golden hours when I can film uninterrupted before traffic in our village makes it a more comical stop/start process.
Today’s whopping production list, which is fast becoming the norm, consists of:
creative tutorials for KS1/2 on mini beasts plus the 1968 space landing;
a proof of concept video for a potential community festival project;
dressing up in a frock for my tongue-in-cheek video tutorial, keeping our over 55s happily dancing;
new exercises for our adult Dance-at-Home programme; and
back into the back office with my formal ‘expert’ hat on, in a Zoom video interview about how Covid-19 is affecting me as an artist.
BUT, THERE IS AN IMPORTANT MISSING PIECE!
The pandemic slammed the door shut on my ability to create work that was not teaching focused. I’ve felt trapped in a state of limbo exacerbated by my perception from social media that other artists were all being brilliantly proactive and artistic. I’ve just not wanted to be or even felt the slightest bit creative. Thankfully, two interventions have given me a helpful nudge to break that stalemate.
The first was making a small contribution to Luca Silvestrini’s Protein ‘The Sun Inside’ project. It was like a spring clean of my soul. A moment to play, for someone else, with no pressure for it to be anything other than my reaction to sunlight, all done in the safety of our courtyard.
Then via Facebook an accidental reconnection with Tomos Young a dancer based in Norway. From a simple ‘How you coping?’ type message we’ve since spent many a long video chat during the crisis supporting each other through this nightmare.
Today was another regular video check-in with Tomos. Surprisingly from those often raw personal chats, plus a dollop of friendly goading, something creative is forming. Tonight, as nightfall descends on the garage, with some assistance from my non-dancing husband, I’m stepping out of my comfort zone (going semi naked) so I can experiment with light and push my iPhone abilities to the max.
It’s early stages but it’s very exciting to be working on something for myself again.