I am I was (a dying swan)

concept, choreography and performance: Sue Hawksley
design: Simon Biggs
performed November 2001, Derby Dance Centre; January 2002, Resolution! The Place, London.

With support from East Midlands Arts; Film and Video Umbrella; Sheffield Hallam University

I am I was (a dying swan) is a solo work exploring loss of identity and the vulnerability of a person confronted by and immersed in the processes of decay. The piece is performed within a live video-projection system designed by artist Simon Biggs. This system uses 3 standard video cameras and 3 projectors to establish an "image-decay" series; the dancer is confronted by her dying image, the image of herself in a process of decay. The choreographic material references Fokine's original solo for Anna Pavlova but the work is mainly informed and led by the constraints and conditions of this system.It also draws on the poem "Death Fugue" by Paul Celan, resulting in a deliberately taut, anxiously repetitive vocabulary.