Siobhan DaviesTransparent
Freesheet
Transparent is a film by Siobhan Davies in collaboration with David Hinton and Hugo Glendinning that acts as a gentle manifesto, reflecting on a life’s work in dance.
The film is called Transparent because for several years I used both tracing paper and acetate to write down notes and collect imagery. Dance involves movement and constant change and the see-through nature of my note taking helped me to experience ideas and images as less fixed in time or place but rather on the way to becoming something else or emerging out of what came before.
Siobhan Davies
At the heart of this evening of film and conversation are the reflections of dancer and choreographer Siobhan Davies as she unpicks the complex processes that underpin a life’s work in dance. She looks far beyond herself, touching upon the histories of movement embedded in each of us, allowing the watcher to enter a descriptive world and feel the weight of their own body – walking or turning or falling. The images in the film which come from ancient sculpture, modern artworks and personal photos, echo Davies’ thoughts, showing the physical fluidity and depth of movement between all things.
For Davies, each interaction with a work of art is a collaboration and her work with David Hinton and Hugo Glendinning is no different. Turning the filming process into a choreography, intertwining the vision of three very different makers to construct a screen work that shape-shifts between biography, lecture, exhibition, psychological study, and scientific experiment. On the surface of Transparent there is a delicate sense of autobiographical narrative, but this narrative reveals a shifting archive of movement and experience.
After the film screening, following a brief pause, Siobhan Davies will join Gareth Evans, Adjunct Moving Image Curator of Whitechapel Gallery on stage for a conversation about this collaboration. This conversation will be supported by BSL interpreter Debbie Lawrence.
Artistic Team & Credits
Animation Editing Noriko Okaku
Cinematography “Transparency” (Part 3) Hugo Glendinning
Producer Pinky Ghundale
Archive Producer Fourth Drawer
Production Assistance Rosa Manzi Reid
Sound Design Chu-Li Shewring, Stefan Smith
Additional Composition “A Lived In Circle” (Part 2) Stefan Smith
Sound Supervisor Chu-Li Shewring
Music Matteo Fargion, Aisha OrazbayevaVo
Recording Hugo Glendinning, Andy Franzkowiak
Archive Support Rob Prouse
Distribution & Exhibition Consultant Johanna Blair
Creative Consultant Gareth Evans
Siobhan Davies Studios Executive Director Damaris Mcdonald
Siobhan Davies Studios Development Manager Carrie Anne Ratcliff
Commissioned and supported by Siobhan Davies Studios using public funding from Arts Council England. With funding from The Linbury Trust, Sarah Wigglesworth and Jeremy Till, Susan Butterworth, Val Bourne, Israel, Gordon & Co. Ltd Insurance Brokers, Caroline Miller, Marie-Anne Mcquay, Siobhan Davies, and all those who generously donated and wish to remain anonymous.
Biographies
Siobhan Davies
Siobhan Davies is a renowned British choreographer who rose to prominence in the 1970s. Davies was a founding member of London Contemporary Dance Theatre and in 1982 joined forces with Richard Alston and Ian Spink to create independent dance company Second Stride. Founding Siobhan Davies Dance in 1988, she works closely with collaborating artists to ensure that their own artistic enquiry is part of the creative process. By 2002 she moved away from the traditional theatre circuit and started making work for gallery spaces. Davies applies choreography across a wide range of creative disciplines including visual arts and film. Recent choreographic works have been presented at some of the most prestigious art institutions in the UK and Europe, including Lenbachhaus (Munich), Whitechapel Gallery and Barbican Gallery (London) and Turner Contemporary (Margate). In 2016 she became Associate Professor at the Centre for Dance Research (CDaRE) at Coventry University.
David Hinton
David Hinton is a BAFTA and Emmy-winning director who has made documentaries about artists of all kinds. He has made dance films with companies as varied as DV8 Physical Theatre and the Royal Swedish Ballet, and he has collaborated with several choreographers to create original dance works for the screen.
Hugo Glendinning
Hugo Glendinning is a photographer and film maker. His eclectic outputs reach across the cultural industries from art collaborations, through production and performance documentation to portrait work. He has worked with numerous leading British theatre and dance companies and has helped many international visual and performance artists to realise projects. These include Matthew Barney, Paola Pivi, Martin Creed, Franko B, Yinka Shonibare and Forced Entertainment. His recordings of performances both for camera and public exhibition, are in private collections and museums around the world.
Gareth Evans
Gareth Evans is a London-based writer, editor, film and event producer and Whitechapel Gallery’s Adjunct Moving Image Curator. He hosts the LRB Screen at Home programme and has co-curated the Forum of the Future Porto, Estuary, First Light, Flipside, Whitstable Biennale and the Swedenborg Film Festival. He commissioned and co-produced the essay films Patience (After Sebald) by Grant Gee (Artevents, 2011), Things (Ben Rivers, FVU, 2014) and World Without End (Jem Cohen, Estuary, 2016). He has programmed major retrospectives of the films of Jem Cohen, Mike Dibb, Xiaolu Guo, Alexander Kluge, Chris Marker, Jonathan Meades and Laura Mulvey & Peter Wollen, alongside numerous film / event seasons and festivals across the UK. He recently wrote the essay accompanying Radiohead’s Kid A MNESIA catalogue.
Pinky Ghundale
Pinky Ghundale produces moving image work and has worked with artists such as Jane and Louise Wilson, Hussein Chalayan, Martina Amati, Tacita Dean, Zarina Bhimji and Michael Landy. For 25 years she has produced artworks presented worldwide by Oscar and Turner Prize winning artist/director Sir Steve McQueen. Pinky acted as Line Producer on the BAFTA award winning documentary Uprising and is the Production Advisor for Film London’s FLAMIN Fellowship Programme.
