Cafe Reason at The Ashmolean
August Bank holiday Monday at The Ashmolean, Cafe Reason in collaboration with Moving Tone performed a work in progress in The Randolph Gallery. Visitors saw and heard our white clad figures amoung the statues and formal architecture of the gallery and also seated, standing and passing in close close proximity. We went armed with a plan -knowing the audience would be the most unpredictable aspect. However, we were not prepared for the number there greeting us nor for the public to have already taken up occupancy of all the central benches which we’d optimistically earmarked for certain sections of the piece. This led to some nice slow motion jostling for space and as with all improvisations, instant decisions and adaptations of plans. It was also really interesting noticing just how the audience chose to respond – many content to accommodate a dancer in their midst , others resolutely unyielding like passengers on an overcrowded train unwilling to give up their seat and yet others respectfully or apologetically hastily making room.
We enjoyed our outing in the Ashmolean. The great acoustics of the space helped enormously in this one of our first more full attempts to incorporate sound and voice together with movement of the dancers and the feedback on this aspect of the performance in particular is very encouraging.
Photo: Peter Green