"Beyond the border there's threat and seduction"
Autor: Baxa in Edinburgh | Publicado: 2013-04-30T13:25:00-07:00


So Saturday afternoon arrived with a clear sky, scorching sun, and a decent number of people who turned up for the performance. One advantage of being in a place that is more relaxed about all sorts of licensing is that everything is easier, therefore being allowed to perform in the Park and the old market steps was just a matter of a phone call to the Tourism Director of Livramento and a quick visit to the Culture Director of Rivera, who both OK'd our occupation. They also said yes to the installations we wanted to set up, wrapping the Obelisk in wool, painting one of the steps and hanging lots of kites on a centennial tree. No paperwork or money required, just smiles. A disadvantage of this lack of formality is that everyone else is entitled to do the same. And on a sunny Saturday afternoon it was only natural that a few different groups had plans to use the Park.

Firstly, I stopped by a fruit stall set up by local farmers by the Obelisk in the morning, just to let them know that at around 3.40pm there would be a performance there and to invite them to watch it. More of a courtesy just to let them know we would be prancing past their stall and probably scaring their customers away. They were fine with it.
Secondly, I found out there was a group of cyclists planning to meet and set off on a tour from near the Obelisk. I located some of them and informed them about the performance too, and warned them that there would be bits of wool stretched everywhere around the Obelisk and it was probably not a good idea to cycle through it as they might get decapitated. They thanked me for the advice.
Then, as our audience started to arrive, Louisa pointed out what looked like a religious group gathering and sitting on the base of the Obelisk. I went up to speak to them and kindly ask them to move, but when I got closer I realised these were the family and friends of one the taxi drivers that were murdered in Livramento last month. They were getting together for a memorial march. I couldn't just shift them out of the way. I found one of the organisers and just explained we would be doing a performance, apologising for not knowing about the march before hand. I was told they would be leaving soon and going down the High Street in Livramento towards the church and would be out of the way before we arrived at the Obelisk. We were both happy our groups wouldn't clash, so I went back and started organising the audience on the steps between the Fountain and the Obelisk.

Thus, having negotiated with most of the other groups using the Park that day, we started our performance. The audience seemed a bit unsure at the very start, kind of shy to integrate the chorus that would awaken Gwen's Free Spirit. Encouraged by myself, Pat and Julia, they eventually joined in and realised this was not going to be a "just-sit-and-watch" type of show. The Spirit was summoned and stepped out of the Fountain, was given her accordion and cajoled by Eli's character to play us a lovely tune. We got the party started and moved up towards the Obelisk led by all performers with the help of Julia's dance with the boleadeiras. The space was clear when we got there and we could perform the ritual of creating borders and binding the otherwise Free Spirit without problems.

That said, there's always lots of risks and unpredictability when you're performing outdoors. Turns out the memorial march stopped halfway through crossing the street for a minute of silence followed by a moment of prayer, which unfortunately happened right when we were happily crossing the street singing, dancing and clapping...! We had an incredibly awkward dilemma for a split second between not letting our energy drop and respecting their moment of prayer, and some of the group went with the first option, some chose the second and something as simple as crossing the street became a rather messy action. I would like to publicly apologise to the marchers and say that it really wasn't our intention to interrupt their memorial.

We picked up our rhythm again after turning the corner and walking past the market up to the steps. We had gathered a following amongst the market vendors by this point and it was great to take our audience past them to cheers, clapping, wolf-whistling and calls of "Arriba Escocia!". Louisa was already in position to start her score and Pat was still finishing the setup of Alice's tree. The timing was just perfect and the audience never noticed the stage management moving up and down the street like mad. Another challenge we had to face up there was the tour buses. There was a wall of parked coaches along the steps with the engines running ready to depart as soon as the Saturday shoppers returned carrying their fleeces, booze, TVs, air conditioners, cosmetics, etc., acquired at the duty free shops of Rivera. I had to sneak past the audience and have a word with the bus drivers to ask them to turn the engines off for a few minutes, and although they took a little longer than I expected, they agreed eventually and sat back to watch the show too.

This is when I noticed our audience had grown. A few people must have followed us from the streets, the Culture Director of Livramento had turned up with a camera, and the locals living in the area had come out to their balconies and windows to watch, as well as the returning shoppers, the car watchers and shop attendants. It was a great feeling which also invaded the performers and gave them a big injection of positive energy much needed after walking through the memorial march. We moved from Louisa's piece to Jessie's, and I watched with delight as a man standing in front of me constantly commented the piece with his wife, almost narrating the story, immediately reacting to the things happening to the character. After Jessie, Sarah took over and delivered a very strong and brave performance which drew impressed comments from a few audience members. Finally, we reached the beautiful tree at the top of the steps where Alice and her kites were and finished the performance with a generous measure of lyricism.

I am incredibly proud of the Explorers, including Julia (who participated on the workshops and featured briefly but beautifully in the final piece) and Bia (who took part in some of the initial exchanges, but due to other commitments couldn't be there for the showcase), and all the kids who took the workshops with Eli and were always keen to contribute with the piece. I heard lots of encouraging and excited feedback from the audience members, including Michel, Tanise and the Culture Director, Mr. J. N. Canabarro, who is an actor himself. The Photo Club of Livramento arranged to have their meeting there to shoot our piece, and their lovely photos can be seen here.

I'll leave it here for now, and will post again in a couple of days to share some of the notes we discussed after a long feedback session, as well as information on what happens next. Thanks for reading this far, and please bear with us for a few more days. ;)