A multi disciplinary solo homage to the avant-garde, to kitsch, shtick, and academia, to snobbery, trash and easy laughs.
Inspired by 'high' and 'low' culture, the 70’s, unintelligible academic language, classic crooners, Rihanna, Scouse female fashions, dereliction and shopping centres, The Sand Dog Cometh offers: Virtuosity? Intellectual stimulation? Distraction? Provocation? Catharsis?
Dear Audience: What is it you care about?
On a mission to defy audience expectations, I wanted to make a show that opened like a mutant Russian doll. What if everything that happens in the performance does not belong after what came before? What if each new section ruptures the audience's orientation and their assumptions about genre?
Preparation:
Interview experts and academics on performance. Track down ‘wildness’ in the body, in supposed contrast to dance training. Stalk and eavesdrop on shoppers to write a first world stand up routine. Dress in ‘Scouse drag’ inspired by local youth fashion. Dance for local teenagers in the shopping centre.
Photo: Mark Loudon Graphic Design: Doug Kerr
crouching in an animal-like position wearing a pink fleshy unitard with a tutu made of a curly reddish wig
my pelvis in a pink fleshy unitard with tutu made of a curly reddish wig emerges from underneath a black dress
2 hands the floor, fingers opened to release crushed red flowers
crouching in an animal-like position wearing a pink fleshy unitard with a tutu made of a curly reddish wig
Photos by Mark Loudon
Tour dates 2014-2016
9th March, 2016 The House, Plymouth University
28th & 29th January 2016 Noh Space, San Francisco, CA, USA
2nd February 2016 PADL West presents Arts & Lectures Series at California State University San Marcos, USA
November 10th, 2015, The Rose Theatre at Edge Hill University, Ormskirk
October 14th, 2015 The Unity Theatre Liverpool, Liverpool
October 8th, 2015 Decoda presents at the Ellen Terry Building, Coventry University
London March 24th, 2015 SPRINT festival at Camden People's Theatre
November 18th, 2014 Capstone Theatre, Hope University, Liverpool
works in progress
April 4th & 5th, 2014 double bill with Jamie Wood at the Bike Shed Theatre, Exeter
May 24th, 2014 Physical Fest 2014 at The Unity Theatre, Liverpool
“she performs like a hungry, haunted, inspired and inscrutable beast - a very smart, very talented, very human, very perceptive, very elegant, very bold beast... hilarious as well. I laughed harder than I have in ages. For real.”
- Kathleen Hermesdorf
dancer and choreographer, La Alternativa, San Francisco
d. 2020 R.I.P. beloved teacher
Created and performed by: Mary Pearson
Visual collaboration with: Anne Sophie Malmberg (DK/Berlin)
With support from Decoda, Liverpool John Moore's University, The Bluecoat, Liverpool Hope University, and Arts Council England