Women's Writing for Performance

Marisa Carnesky

Marisa in the workshop

EVENT ARCHIVES

Working with the Burlesque

with Marisa Carnesky

This workshop took place on Thursday 27 April 2006 in the Playroom Studio, Lancaster University

To see film footage from the workshop:

About Marisa Carnesky

workshop performances

Workshop performances

workshop performance 3

Influenced by illusion, folklore, burlesque and inspired by her own Eastern European heritage, live performers in the fairground, and particularly the tradition of the tattooed lady, Marisa Carnesky has been making inter-disciplinary performance work for over a decade. She trained as a dancer, visual artist, and performance artist and produces work, which, whilst exploring notions of cultural identity, sexuality and gender, touches the fantastic and the provocative. She has performed on a regular basis with shows that combine modern performance with the spectacular style of the cabaret and the freakshow. Marisa's recent work includes: Carnesky's Ghost Train , an authentic touring ghost train ride featuring spectacular visual, digital media and magic effects; and "Jewess Tattooess", where her own markedly and beautifully tattooed body is the focus of a work that examines her relationship to Jewish culture and the Holocaust through elements of Yiddish and victorian melodrama, the macabre French Grand Guignol theatre, and the German expressionist films of the twenties.

REVIEWS

'A touring blend of fairground attraction and conceptual art... It has a beauty and elegance we seldom see nowadays.' The Times

'A mixture of tat and exotica with illusion and magic, [it] offers the audience hard truths about centuries of dispossession and displacement... The piece's ragged quirkiness is all part of its power, as is the way that Carnesky presents a startling body of evidence about Europe's invisible people. ' The Guardian

'Jewess Tattooess... enchanted and personal, beautiful penny dreadful.'
Glasgow Herald

CURRENT PRODUCTIONS
Carnesky's Ghost Train Hurtle through a disorientating journey and marvel at the astonishing collage of images, sounds and spectacular magic. This is a place where the phantasmagorical collides with fragments of stories of displacement, broken journeys and disappeared women.
The show is set in a real ghost train ride. It blazes with the thrill of the fairground and the excitement of live performance. Includes moving audience carriages and live elements of aerial flying, moving sets, dance and mime.

The Girl From Nowhere A multi-media theatre event which explores women's journeys from Eastern Europe to the West, told through filmed testimony, spectacular magic illusions, text, soundtrack and music.

Jewess Tattooess Explores the Jewish taboo of tattooing, looking at the cultural and religious implications of a Jewish woman who, by choice, is heavily tattooed.

About the Workshop

workshop performances 5

Marisa led a practical workshop on devised performance exploring the use of popular entertainment forms such as magic, burlesque and fairground in new performance and how they can be used metaphorically to explore wider themes.

Participants were asked to bring one of the following to the workshop: an object about which they can tell a story which has personal meaning – this could be an ornament or jewellery; a picture that moves them; an item of clothing that they find interesting. The workshop began with physical warm ups, theatre games and trust exercises, leading to group and solo improvisations on a theme and devised performance. It also looked at movement, voice, spatial awareness, alongside theme and content.

return to events archive

		EVENT ARCHIVES Working with the Burlesque with Marisa Carnesky This workshop took place on Thursday 27 April 2006 in the Playroom Studio, Lancaster University To see film footage from the workshop: click here for broadband realplayer click here for modem realplayer click here for broadband Windows Media Player click here for modem windows media player
	About Marisa Carnesky	Influenced by illusion, folklore, burlesque and inspired by her own Eastern European heritage, live performers in the fairground, and particularly the tradition of the tattooed lady, Marisa Carnesky has been making inter-disciplinary performance work for over a decade. She trained as a dancer, visual artist, and performance artist and produces work, which, whilst exploring notions of cultural identity, sexuality and gender, touches the fantastic and the provocative. She has performed on a regular basis with shows that combine modern performance with the spectacular style of the cabaret and the freakshow. Marisa's recent work includes: Carnesky's Ghost Train , an authentic touring ghost train ride featuring spectacular visual, digital media and magic effects; and "Jewess Tattooess", where her own markedly and beautifully tattooed body is the focus of a work that examines her relationship to Jewish culture and the Holocaust through elements of Yiddish and victorian melodrama, the macabre French Grand Guignol theatre, and the German expressionist films of the twenties. REVIEWS 'A touring blend of fairground attraction and conceptual art... It has a beauty and elegance we seldom see nowadays.' The Times 'A mixture of tat and exotica with illusion and magic, [it] offers the audience hard truths about centuries of dispossession and displacement... The piece's ragged quirkiness is all part of its power, as is the way that Carnesky presents a startling body of evidence about Europe's invisible people. ' The Guardian 'Jewess Tattooess... enchanted and personal, beautiful penny dreadful.' Glasgow Herald CURRENT PRODUCTIONS Carnesky's Ghost Train Hurtle through a disorientating journey and marvel at the astonishing collage of images, sounds and spectacular magic. This is a place where the phantasmagorical collides with fragments of stories of displacement, broken journeys and disappeared women. The show is set in a real ghost train ride. It blazes with the thrill of the fairground and the excitement of live performance. Includes moving audience carriages and live elements of aerial flying, moving sets, dance and mime. The Girl From Nowhere A multi-media theatre event which explores women's journeys from Eastern Europe to the West, told through filmed testimony, spectacular magic illusions, text, soundtrack and music. Jewess Tattooess Explores the Jewish taboo of tattooing, looking at the cultural and religious implications of a Jewish woman who, by choice, is heavily tattooed.
	About the Workshop	Marisa led a practical workshop on devised performance exploring the use of popular entertainment forms such as magic, burlesque and fairground in new performance and how they can be used metaphorically to explore wider themes. Participants were asked to bring one of the following to the workshop: an object about which they can tell a story which has personal meaning – this could be an ornament or jewellery; a picture that moves them; an item of clothing that they find interesting. The workshop began with physical warm ups, theatre games and trust exercises, leading to group and solo improvisations on a theme and devised performance. It also looked at movement, voice, spatial awareness, alongside theme and content.


		return to events archive