1. Developing Group Improvisation
We see how a group improvisation is transferred from the studio to the site and eventually becomes the opening act to the entire work. The screen on the right shows how the theme of bells is woven through other sections which were created in response to the site and its variety of areas. The grave yard at the front of the building is a place for a recapitulation of work that happened inside the chapel. The place is becoming the formative influence over the choreography taken from the studio. This process of refining and then re-positioning material arising from an initial improvisation activity is used productively in Cyrff Ystwyth’s work.
3. Celebrating Taboos
At a later point Adrian has suggested a piece that celebrates what might be considered taboo in the context of the Welsh chapel: the pleasure of dancing, flirting and overt sexuality. We see how the theme emerges in rehearsal as a group piece that is difficult to articulate and is completed on site. This moment reveals how effectively the technique of juxtaposition can be employed, placing a feeling and mode of performance within the chapel, which deliberately plays against the behaviours expected in that place.
5. Before the Performance
The screens in this clip show Bronant, the pub opposite the chapel, which unlike the chapel is still open. The technical team are eating before the show. The chapel is directly opposite the pub, the open fire a natural focus is set against the England football game on the TV. The other screen shows Adrian leaving his house at the farm to prepare for performance. Tradition and modernity are juxtaposed. Adrian’s first response to the project is re-enacted as we see him in the car on his way to work. This clip suggests how dwelling in the locality of the chapel - which includes the nearby pub - for the weekend of the performance engages all the participants in the ‘place’ of Adrian’s home village. Bronant is shared through such inhabitation, even if it is temporary.
2. Bells
The clip shows an improvisation with bells that Adrian had requested. Exploration begins in the studio and is then transferred to the site, where the quality and positioning of the sound is shifted and in turn, shifts the site in which it is placed during a night-time rehearsal. A further outcome from the original improvisation follows where the ringing of bells is ‘played out’ within the disused chapel itself, a major part of the performance site.
4. Umbrellas
In the studio and late in the process, the company work with umbrellas for the first time. Some people find them difficult to manipulate. We then see how the company begin to work with the umbrellas in a particular section of the work rehearsed on site. The umbrellas are a practical device rather than an aesthetic choice as the weather is bad. However, on site, they exceed their function in that the use and presence of umbrellas in the piece speaks to, and of, the everyday operations that were a part of attending the chapel, reminding us of its use and inhabitation in the past.