{"id":1179,"date":"2013-05-06T18:33:07","date_gmt":"2013-05-06T17:33:07","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/sallypommeclayton.com\/blog\/?p=1179"},"modified":"2023-06-22T13:42:41","modified_gmt":"2023-06-22T12:42:41","slug":"becoming-invisible","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/makeandbelieve.uk\/?p=1179","title":{"rendered":"Becoming invisible"},"content":{"rendered":"\n\n\n\n\n

My aim when telling a story is to become invisible, so that the listener can see the characters and images, and enter the emotions of the story. But paradoxically, becoming invisible doesn’t happen by doing nothing, it demands huge physical and energetic work, and conscious choices about every moment. I am very interested in how using gestures can help images come alive in the audience’s imagination. Gesture can transform the performer and the space around them, and transport the listener into the world of the story.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

If you want to explore using gesture in your storytelling, you need to choose who is making the gesture:
The narrator<\/strong><\/em> – describing, showing, relating.
A character<\/strong><\/em> – doing, saying, feeling.
The commentator<\/strong><\/em> – making an aside, commenting.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

My starting point is the visual world of the story, and the images, senses and emotions aroused by the narrative. Break the story down, scene by scene and explore how you can use gesture to become characters, reveal locations,  conjure emotions. Gestures can be tiny, large, stylized, expressive, mimetic. They can be made by fingertips, incorporate the whole body, or use different levels in space. You might explore the use of rhythm, repetition, symmetry, opposites, asymmetry. But it is essential to be able to find, and re-find a neutral state, so that you can move with absolute clarity between roles and gestures.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The storyteller is playing many roles in a performance and different gestures have different effects. Gestures can: make a relationship; illustrate or describe; suggest or evoke; comment or make an aside. If a gesture is descriptive there needs to be a visual accordance between the gesture and the world being described. So if I am making the gesture of putting a baby in a basket, I need to know what size the baby is, and where the basket is in space. If the gesture doesn’t look convincing then it can undermine the story, and the audience see more of me and less of the image. When I am being the narrator I might use more generalised gesture, but when I am being a character I will need to find specific gestures that evoke who the character is and what they are doing. All this takes creative choices, control and practise.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

You can draw on the stylized vocabulary that already exists in many forms of  <\/span>dance.  <\/span>I am inspired by looking at paintings and sculptures. I watch how people use gestures in everyday life – politicians are especially interesting and surprisingly expressive! But watching dancers is the most inspiring of all, and I can only wish!<\/p>\n\n\n

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\"Gestures<\/a>
Gestures with a statue!
Sally Pomme Clayton at The British Museum<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n

How the storyteller uses voice, language, space, dialogue, description, humour, pauses … all help them become invisible. I will write about these things another time!<\/p>\n