Wednesday, July 24, 2013

Ashlee Laing - Greening - Artecycle 2013 - Upcycling Series - INTERVIEWS





Artecycle is the annual non-acquisitive art award held at The Incinerator Gallery in Moonee Ponds. Inspired by the striking 1929 Walter Burley Griffin Building this exhibition has become an important event on the annual arts calendar bringing together artists from around the country who are negotiating waste, recycling, environmentalism and sustainablility in a plethora of ways and means. As a part of his series of profiles on visual artists working with waste and upcycling Paul Andrew speaks to artist Ashlee Laing.

Artists who inspire you Ashlee?

The artists that I’m beginning to delve into at the moment are Nedko Solakov, Hans Haacke and Rachel Harrison. I’ve known about these artists for a while but I haven’t really got to know them in an in-depth or influential kind of way and am now just beginning to research their practices, amazing artists.

If I have to look back or choose two artists who I have long admired and who inspire me most of all, I would have to say Felix Gonzales-Torres and Nan Goldin.

I still get butterflies in my tummy when I see their work in the flesh. What really resonates with me is that both of these artists made art directly from life, about life, and specifically about their lives, yet they seem to connect with us, not in demonstrating their lives to us so much, but I guess in some kind of way connecting with the viewer, the other, in really powerful ways. 

For instance, I’m thinking of Gonzales-Torres’s Perfect Lovers as one of the most beautiful, simple and incredibly powerful gestures - two identical clocks on a wall set to the same time and as time ticks by they fall out of sync after having moved, however briefly, perfectly together.

What I love about this work is that it’s just so simple and so germane to interpersonal relationships, to life, such a powerful piece of visual poetry.

And, Nan Goldin, who you know, for years has documented her life and the people in her life. I remember while living in Hamburg for a little while, a time when the Ballard of Sexual Dependency was installed at The Hamburger Kunsthalle, I went there almost daily for several weeks whilst I was unemployed and just sat there on the red velvet cinema chairs immersed in the installation, the slide show, of her life.

I was truly mesmerized by these photos, these photos of everydayness, that were images of stuff that anybody could have taken, images that you’ve taken, that we all take, that I’ve taken, documenting time, party times, documenting life, documenting the good and the bad.  I mean I remember taking a photo of myself crying at one time, just to see what I looked like, to see what an emotion looked like. Her work really captures that, for me, really captures the emotional connection and



What inspired you to enter the 2013 Artecycle Exhibition?


I guess what attracted me initially to apply for the 2013 Artecycle Award was for the opportunity that my work could be in an exhibition that had a prize attached to it and the possibility of winning that prize - money is hard to find when you're an artist. 

These kinds of exhibitions, exhibitions with prizes and awards attached to them put together by public galleries are also another way of exhibiting - an economical way of exhibiting. As an early career artist these types of exhibitions also provide opportunities to exhibit in a public gallery context, to a wider audience, alongside artists with more established careers.

I remember seeing the call out for this show and thinking “Oh, I should really make that sculpture I’ve been banging on about for years” but it hasn’t happened yet. With further reading of the call out I noted that the entries had been diversified and artist could submit work that dealt with issues of sustainability and the environment without having to use recycled materials. 

This is when I thought that my work “Bush Vandal (Green wash) would be a good fit as it dealt with ideas of, notions of environment disaster and the impact of contemporary culture and consumerism upon the natural and constructed environments we inhabit. 

Artists upcycle wit differing intentions?

Yes, in fact, I couldn’t even begin to try and categorize the diversity of work being produced at the moment. I’ll leave that for the art historians/theoreticians to ponder. For me, art and it’s varied outputs simply fall under the HUGE umbrella term - Contemporary Art Practice, which provides more than enough food for thought.

It’s interesting to look at say, art education (although fraught) over the past several decades and note the break down of disciplinary practice. 

Art making now being an interdisciplinary process relying on a multitude of factors for the articulations of concepts. What's fantastic is that Contemporary art practice crosses different genres, different disciplines; it’s a hodge-podge of coming up with ideas, objects, propositions or whatever it is that really finds; that locates and exemplifies the essence of the idea that is being expressed rather than formally working within a more kind of disciplined approach to media, something that I am much more excited about than working exclusively with a particular media. I am much more interested in the idea and finding a way that best facilitates and resolves that idea - relying on a multi-disciplinary approaches to art making.

The diversity of the work in Artecyle reflects the interdisciplinary nature of art practice. This can be seen by tracing the history of the prize that was initially a sculptural prize that dealt with recycled materials, found objects, waste etc and all those words that we use to describe the readymade and its re-signification. This year it was opened up to include other works that were not only made from such materials or processes but work that was conceptually located within the discourses surrounding environment and sustainability. I guess my work was selected as it's a landscape video and deals with me in that landscape doing something quite absurd, and in an unconscious way has an environment message. 

At the time this wasn’t the reason or impetus for the work I made but through a series of coincidences and reflections it poetically speaks of the destruction of the environment.

In fact I wouldn’t say that I am an environmental artist or that my work deals exclusively with issues surrounding the environment. I guess I make work that poetically comments upon social conditions, usually a response to the limitations of or restrictions that culture, that society inflict upon my being. 

Historically - the 90’s had a major impact on me, work was made about identity and its inherent politics, I’m thinking Barbara Krueger, Jenny Holzer - those kind of artist who were about exposing the inequality and I guess I think it’s even more pertinent now in 2013 to be exposing that because things like homosexuality, things like adoption, giving blood, things like being a woman, or being one of the genders between male and female, things like being an asylum seeker, these identities, these rights are still not equal with what the so called majority of the population are privileged to. 

I mean homosexuals are not equal - homosexuality has been captured by consumerist culture and rendered a lifestyle, and this is something that I am still very passionate about  - making work that subtlety exposes that - blatantly exposes that - poetically exposes that; perhaps not even exposes but work that proposes and questions is where I am coming from.


Tell me about the video work Bush Vandal?

Bush Vandal (Green wash) was developed while I was the artist in residence at Birrarung house as part of the Nillumbik shire councils Laughing Waters Artist in Residence program in aug-sept 2012. Birrarung House is a beautiful 1970’s mud brick house designed by Gordon Ford along the Yarra River in Eltham. When I first arrived I began to explore the landscape, the environment, by embarking on daily walks through the bush and along the river. 

The bush here was somewhat dense and fallen trees, trees that appear to have been snapped off at their middle, continually obstructed my walks through it and thus I was constantly navigating new passageways through the bush. From this I got the idea of heading out with different coloured gouache and every time a fallen tree blocked my path I would paint the tree in a really bright, almost toxic colour. 

The colours came about because I had noticed that most of the trees in the area had brightly coloured fungus growing on the south-side of their trunks - this being the side that didn’t get sunlight. This also tapped into the idea of brightly coloured things usually being dangerous. I’d been out here for only about a week at this stage and was finding it difficult to actual location where I was. 

I mean I knew that I was along the river, outside of Eltham but I was unsure of how far the next house actually was, where anyone was living there, whose land was on when walking etc. So when I got back to house I did a Google maps search view of where I was and realized through this Google map search that the fence that I had jumped wasn’t into private property but was into Parks Victoria Land. 

This residency is run in collaboration with Parks Vic and I had signed a contract agreeing not to interfere or damage the environment in anyway. Realizing that I had breached my contract and that I had damaged the environment I became completely paranoid that I had breached my contract and that I was going to be the first artist evicted from the residency in it’s entire history for painting trees. 

So I filled my rucksack with booze bottles (the only bottles I had around - thankfully plonk is now screw top) full of water, and the only scrubbing type of brush I could find in the house was the toilet brush. So I set off with this, back to the tree I had painted and proceeded to video myself scrubbing it clean - removing my crime. I videoed this process, as I am one of these artists that in the past had lost a lot of work by not documenting it. I know obsessively document everything I do. Now, I hadn’t spoke to a living soul either in person or via technology for about 5 or 6 days at this time, which in context of our current culture is a rarity.

It was also bizarre to be only ten minutes from Eltham by car but feel completely isolated and unsure of who was around the area, other than knowing that there were people around, somewhere, which added to a kind of fear I think which I kind of got carried away with.

Anyway, I was out there scrubbing off this gouache as quickly as I could. The tree I had painted was about 30 meters way from a fire track. Three quarters of the way through cleaning the tree I heard a car coming down the fire track, now being completely paranoid at this stage I’m like OMG it's the ranger, OMG they’re gunna see what I have done, catch me in the act, I’m gunne be thrown out - this is gunna be sooooo embarrassing while I am scrubbing, scrubbing, scrubbing away. 

I could see the car fortunately they couldn’t see me. They proceeded to do a 4 point turn and proceed back up the hill - I drop everything and hide behind a bush, while the camera continues to record the static frame and sound of the car and then when safe I return to the scene and continue cleaning up. That's how the work came about. I was retifying an act of vandalism

This lead me to think about corporations and the idea of green products and that more money, time and non-green processes go into the advertising of environmentally friendly products rather than spending resources on developing and sustaining environmentally sound practices/ products. It's installed in the gallery on a slick near infinity edge LCD TV (very environmental) and is mounted on the brick wall of the downstairs gallery of The Incinerator Art Centre. It plays for about 5 mins an 30 seconds and is looped.

It has a charm this work doesn't it, it's enchanting?

People really seem to enjoy it. I think what they enjoy about it the most is that it is kind of comical, yet sinister. I forgot that I am quite theatrical in my approach as well as my being that I can be quite camp which contradicts my physical image which people of see as a big burley, scarey kind of guy and really I am a pink pussy cat. So I think that the image of myself, the gestures, and the reaction to the car, the crisis that this temporally presents is something that people responded to. I am not sure what the judges liked about this work for it to be included in the show other the similarities to what I have just said. 

I also think that Bush Vandal (Green wash) was a good example of a different approach that artists use to engage in the political discourses surrounding the environment and environmentalism.

So many artists in the exhibition with different angles to upcycling?

It’s interesting seeing the work in this context or in an exhibition about environmental art, as I said I have never really engaged with environmentalism before and Bush Vandal (Green Wash) was an indirect response to this theme. 

It started off as a painting exercise really in order to begin a daily practice while in residence doing something everyday in order to begin the process of making art and that's what happened. This work also taps into, through the imagery and my persona, the action of pouring water over the tree which has this feel of pouring petrol over the tree and that perhaps I am about to start a fire which brings this other sinister reading of the Australian bush, landscape, environment and how vulnerable it is, how aggressive it is, how volatile it is. 

There are some provocative sequences that happen in the work that highlight different elements for people to contemplate one being the red-neck bogan in the bush; the booze thing; the aggressive volatile nature of the heteronormative masculine identity of the Australian male.

How does this work tie in with your recent photo/video based works?

Recent photographic and video based work sees me play with multiple, minority identities in an attempt to confront the audience with the ingrained cultural fear and bigotry that seems deeply etched into the Australian landscape, constitution and psyche. 

I am conceptually driven and utilise photography, video, objects and public space to articulate my visual responses. My practice is about the placement and location of the individual and of the collective within the construction of socio-cultural spaces. It explores the relationship between ourselves (identity) and the combination of social, cultural and environmental factors that influence and challenge our identities. I am interested in the boundaries enforced upon the individual by cultural, sub-cultural and self-identification codes. 

The outcomes of my conceptual investigations rely on the development and use of a visual language or system of signs taken from a variety of cultures. My work is poetic and political; and continues to embody notions of intimacy, mortality, sexuality, gender, race and ethnicity. Through my work I seek to challenge and provoke questions rather than answer them.

Where do you think your work is located in art hitorical terns?
Hmmm in an art historical context I am not really sure, you know, I guess that landscape depicted in the video is a very McCubbin-esq landscape so there is a reference/play upon that and the Heidelberg School - traditional landscape painting in Australia. The image in the video, the fixed position of the frame, references painting and photography - a time-based, moving painting. The painting action, the painting of the snapped, fallen tree illustrates, draws upon, conceptual and contemporary responses to landscape. 

And there are the performativity elements that I play, that I bring to the work. So I guess you could trace a history in that landscape, elements of the history of Australian Landscape painting in this work - historically and conceptually it fits with notions of contemporary art as comment rather than representation.


Useful Links:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ei9FQo5I5xA 

http://mvcc.vic.gov.au/Experience-Moonee-Valley/Arts-and-Culture/Incinerator-Gallery/Artecycle.aspx 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Upcycling 

http://ashleelaing.com/home.html


General Bio
Ashlee Laing was born in Melbourne, Australia in 1974. Laing works in photo-media, video, installation, painting and performance. His practice is concerned with the location of the individual and of the collective with socio-cultural spaces. 



Artecycle Artist Statement 
Bush Vandal (Green Wash) is was developed while on a two-month residence at Birrarung House as part of the Nillumbik Shire Councils Laughing Waters Artist in Residence program.

Bush Vandal (Green Wash) is a 5 min. 32 sec. looped video of a fallen tree in the bush. The tree has been painted with green gouache. The video begins as I start to remove the paint using a toilet brush. It documents my behaviour in the process of rectifying my act of environmental vandalism. The sound in this video is of the actual environment and cleaning process.

Jeremy Blincoe - Saved - Artecycle 2013 - Upcycling Series - INTERVIEWS





Artecycle is the annual non-acquisitive art award held at The Incinerator Gallery in Moonee Ponds. Inspired by the striking 1929 Walter Burley Griffin Building this exhibition has become an important event on the annual arts calendar bringing together artists from around the country who are negotiating waste, recycling, environmentalism and sustainablility in a plethora of ways and means. As a part of his series of profiles on visual artists working with waste and upcycling Paul Andrew speaks to artist Jeremy Blincoe.

Jeremy tell me about your art training?

I studied photography at Massey University in Wellington, New Zealand.  Immediately after finishing I pursued a career in advertising photography and it was not until I shifted to Melbourne in 2008 that my focus switched and I became devoted to working on my own bodies of art work.

The first series Wander and Wonder was created to express my deep concern for what I perceive as the diminishing wonder and imagination amongst future generations. Brought about as technology pervades every aspect of our lives and the beauty of the natural world may be losing its grip, its ability to seize the attention of the modern generation. On a road trip a child’s distant gaze out the window toward a setting sun, is now replaced by an intense gaze into the cool glow of a smart phone.     
                                                                                                                                                                                                                         What theme's in your work have emerged since his time?

My second series Fleeting Embrace focused on the environment, sustainability and principally it raises the question about what we leave for future generations if current environmentally detrimental practises continue.

My series Ephemeral Memory was created to help shine a light on a number of important issues surrounding Indigenous Australians.
My concern for the environment and the fate of indigenous cultures continues to feed into my new work. Though I have also become very intrigued by questions surrounding the formation of the self, the contradictory nature of humans and the spiritual famine within modern culture as the influence of mythology and religious ritual has waned over time coupled with this growing disconnection from nature.  

Tell me more detail about your interest in environmentalism and sustainability, why is this important you?

Although the prospect of settling distant planets is becoming a far more plausible possibility, we only have one planet right now. To quote Carl Sagan this is our very own “mote of dust on a sunbeam.” 

I feel strongly that we all have a responsibility to future generation’s to determine what state the planet is in. It is a humbling thought the idea of tracing your existence back to one common ancestor and how fortuitous we are to be in existence knowing that each of our ancestors has has survived and passed life on to us. Thinking about this heritage gives weight to the importance of environmentalism and sustainability. 
         
Tell me about what inspired you to participate in the 2013 Artecycle exhibition?

It is one the first competition’s/exhibition’s that I have come across that focuses on both the environment and on sustainability. As these are both key threads within my work I jumped at the chance to be involved.

Describe your entry, Untitled?

The work features my friend’s son Samedhi, whose clear plastic bag parachute has deflated leaving him floating aimlessly through a black void. 

The narrative intent behind the image addresses the detrimental impact of the current volume of plastic production for the environment and the uncertainty for what state the environment will be left in for future generations.

Tell me about what you adore most about photography as a medium?

With the advent of technology it gives me the immense freedom of being able to turn any idea into reality. It is also a fantastic catalyst for curiosity, providing me a purpose to seek out pockets of wilderness, explore new places and to meet interesting people. 

Why the realist photography style?

It is closely related to how my imagination conceives ideas and my desire to create new myths, ones that help me become a better human and hopefully have the ability to emotionally connect and plant the seed of a narrative in the viewer’s mind. As much as I revere many traditional analogue photographic artists I yearn to be able to create my own distinct language and make a valid contribution to a medium in which I love and am drawn to.

You commented once about your work for Artecycle 2013; “we are having a love affair with plastic”, what did you mean by this?

Day to day life is almost inseparable from plastic, many see it as an extremely economic and convenient necessity. Yes I do believe we are a disposable culture which is partly due to the dying art of patience. We bemoan the slightest wait time or moderate inconvenience in our lives and often operate in our own isolated bubbles.   

I am guilty of both of these and the mindfulness you mention is perhaps one of the cures. To find transcendence from everyday anxieties and find the realisation that each of us has a part to the play in the welfare of the planet is extremely important.

My greatest concern is that the growing population rates parallels the rise in plastics production and if we will ever be slow down or reverse the consumption rate of the long lasting and extremely convenient commodity.

Long range thinking for the benefit of future generations is something you feel is important too?

Indeed, it is a shame that it takes the stark reality of global climate change for countries to initiate conversations to work together and think about long-term solutions. It is such a difficult road however as strategies are often targeted at resource use, the engine room behind a large proportion of the world’s economies. 
                        
So much of our consumerism seems to be based on excessive consumption, consuming goods with an inbuilt obsolescence and a short use by date - things are not made to last, not well crafeed like they were once, goods are not durable - disposability of consumer goods is paramount now with mass production happening now in China and so on, e goods, mobile phones, PD’s and so on?

It is a huge issue, we crave the fleeting gratification that comes with a shiny new technological toy with often little thought as to where the previous model will now reside.  I yearn to travel and make a series of work in places such as as Ghana and Guiyu in China in order to come to terms with the scale and magnitude of electronic waste epidemic.

Paradoxically photography is one of the few things that we treasure today?

Our memory is an incredibly fickle thing, a nice analogy compares memory to compost heaps which grows and transforms as new content is added often leaving the original form unrecognisable. Photographs are important, as they are powerful triggers to relive experiences. This is an amazing quality for me as one of the ultimate goals in creating an image is to create an emotional trigger in the viewers mind.

There is a recurrent theme in your work about the depiction of youth,  figures alone, floating in nature represented in a fairly iconic peraps even alienated manner?

One of my preoccupying thoughts is maintaining the inner radiance of a child. As time progresses life’s toils and social conventions tend to from rigid armour around each of our inner child. Preying those layers back to maintain wonder, curiosity and an open spirit are important theme that I wish to continue to explore through my work.

And in many of the works there is a mythic quality that pervades te image, many of the figures apppear Icarus like, is this a comment about humanity's hubris in the face of "an epidemic of waste"?

Yes I am fascinated by mythology. Part of the reasoning behind the ‘untethered nature’ of the figures is a re-occurring thought that we are each a tiny fragment of a vast universe our fates often at the whim’s of nature. The ideology of mans domination of nature and the growing disconnections from nature are barriers to mindfulness and environmentalism. 

I am curious as to why your figures are represented in nature vs cities and/or urban contexts, the theatrical quality they espouse? 

The solitude of Australia’s vast landscapes allows me to step away from my sense of self and gain perspective that I am a very small part in a grand universe. In terms of creating work in an urban environment, I love landscapes I think too much too focus on the urban environment and a big part of the thrill is the chance to explore beautifull spots that I may never have visited if it were not for the urge to create driving my curiosity. 

Growing up in New Zealand, definitely helped nurture my appreciation for the natural environment. The house where I grew up backed onto a reserve filled with a dense plantation of bamboo, I couldn’t have asked for a better-secluded playground.

For the untitled image I experimented with placing different landscapes or backdrops behind the figure, but I like the graphic nature of the black void and believe that it helps portray that the future fate of the boy with the deflated parachute is unknown. 

Zeitgeist- your thoughts on what matters now - there is a tendency in contempoary art today to focus on and represent the everyday the mundane the ordinary vicissitudes of life and what do you think this tendency says about society?

I use photography to escape from the realities of the everyday and to ease the burden slightly. As new forms of narcissism have developed via social media platforms individual focus has been shifted inwards, ever so slightly and the grander narratives connecting all humans have been left by the wayside.

And is this to do with making a sense of ourselves in a world that is priamrily about consumption ( and by corollary it's monumental waste) perhaps?

Yes, I believe our perchance for consumption is partly an attempt to fill a spiritual void in our lives. It is a shinning mirage that the latest object of our desires will give such satisfaction, only to dissipate in our hands and leave us searching for the next bigger and greater thing with perhaps a few more unnecessary functions.

Photography tends to make things look good or beautiful, we know this, to your way of thinking what is useful about making waste, about making plastic appear good, redemptive and beautiful like a parachute in the image above?

With all of my work whether they are concerned with the environment or another narrative I strive to make it a thing of beauty to entice the viewer then if all goes well they will delve into the story and create his or her own meaning from the image.

And finally how did it feel seeing your work in the context of this marvelous exhibition about environmentalism and sustainabilty, such a wide range of attifudes towards waste in the exhibition - sartists ike Hannah Bertram are passionate about the poetic possiblities of waste, detritus, dust and others like Ashlee Laing are keen on the political aspect of waste, recycling and so on? 

It was great I think any opportunity to gleam an insight into a range of artists’ perspectives on such an important topic will always be a valuable and worthwhile experience.



Useful Links:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Upcycling

http://www.jeremyblincoe.com/ 

http://mvcc.vic.gov.au/Experience-Moonee-Valley/Arts-and-Culture/Incinerator-Gallery/Artecycle.aspx 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=irY1PsqxlYE 


Photos:
Above: Untitled, 2012
Below, Artist Jeremy Blincoe

Sunday, July 21, 2013

The Reduced Shakespeare Company - Austin Tichenor - The Bible: The Complete Word of God ( abridged ) - INTERVIEWS

http://www.reducedshakespeare.com/

Written by Paul Andrew   
Monday, 22 July 2013 00:00
Austin Tichenor is an actor and Managing Partner of The Reduced Shakespeare Company – as well as Co-Writer and Co–Director of The Bible: The Complete Word of God (abridged), soon to tour Australia. He spoke to Australian Stage's Paul Andrew.



Austin TichenorAn early/childhood theatre memory Austin, a time when you were absolutely enchanted by the stage?
It was a production of The Wizard of Oz and I remember three things: being dazzled by the whole thing; so dazzled I really wanted to meet Dorothy ‘cause I thought she was awesome; and being so scared of the Lion that I hid behind my mother’s skirts when I saw the actors in costume in the lobby. I was four.

Tell me a potted history about your early stage training?
My earliest “training” was the thing I still most highly recommend: Learning by Doing: puppet shows in kindergarten, musicals and Gilbert & Sullivan operettas in high school, and technical theatre with local ballet companies and orchestras.

Was there a formative Shakespeare moment during your training?
While getting my MFA in Directing at Boston University, I was roped into playing Claudius in Hamlet (because I am, as my friends will tell you, the personification of evil). I worked on the text with a great voice teacher named Robert Chapline, and once I began to speak those speeches, it was like learning a new language or to play a musical instrument. Plus sword-fighting!

How do you describe the Reduced Shakespeare company in seven words?
Making long serious topics short and funny.

How do you describe the CWOG narrative in seven words?
We’re celebrating the Bible through reverent irreverence.

For the benefit of AS readers tell me about the formation of the company?
The RSC started as a busking act at Renaissance Faires in 1981 by three Californians who had a shared passion for busty wenches and iambic pentameter. They took their first play to the Edinburgh Fringe Festival in 1987, thinking it’d be their swan song, but that led to international touring, even greater reduction, and a nine-year run in London’s West End.

Tell me something about theatre experiences that truly enthralled you Austin?
My greatest experiences almost always involve the audience. I saw a university production of Cabaret staged in a dining hall where regular non-costumed students stood up in the audience wearing swastika armbands and singing “Tomorrow Belongs To Me”. Chilling. And when I’m performing in RSC shows, I’m always hugely impressed at the audience members who are so caught up in what we’re doing they start to play along without even knowing it.

Is the RSC (same acronym as the Royal Shakespeare Company) inspired by other theatre companies – tell me about this source of inspiration?
Yes, it’s come to our attention that some upstart company in the UK has stolen our initials. We’re pursuing legal action. We’ve been inspired by many professional theatre companies; in fact, when I joined the company in 1992 and began co-creating all of our “Complete (abridged)” comedies, the idea was to turn this summer holidays busking act into a professional theatre with a company of actors performing a repertoire of plays in our “house style” of serious silliness and intellectual vaudeville.

How did you go about writing this new work Austin, struck by lightning, baptism by fire?
After condensing the complete works of Shakespeare and abridging the complete history of America, taking on religion seemed like the next logical step. We were approached by an Israeli TV producer to reduce the Bible for the small screen. That fell through, but the idea wouldn’t die.

Tell me in about the bible?
The three guys who attempt to reduce the Bible into ninety minutes don’t know that what they’re attempting is impossible. That’s funny. But even if they did know it was impossible they’d do it anyway. That’s admirable. And being too stupid to know what you’re doing for the entertainment of others? That’s America.

Is there a quote from the play that continues to make it difficult for you to keep a straight face?
Again, it comes back to the audience. I know all the scripted lines so well they don’t make me laugh anymore. But I never know what the audience is going to do, and sometimes I’ll be bowled over by something we say in response to something they say.

In this secular age what makes a play like this matter?
I’m not a religious person: I rarely look to ancient texts for wisdom and enlightenment, except possibly Shakespeare and every once in a while Star Trek. But the Bible is still one of the fundamental texts of our civilization. And my form of tribute for anything I love is to celebrate it by making fun of it. Ask my wife and kids.

Indeed - what makes humour matter right now?
When has humor ever not mattered?


Les Currie presents
The Bible: The Complete Word of God (abridged)
The Reduced Shakespeare Company

Melbourne
Athenaeum Theatre
August 5 – 18, 2013
(03) 9650 1500 | Ticketek 132 849 | www.ticketek.com.au

Adelaide
Dunstan Playhouse, Festival Centre
August 19 – 21, 2013
Bass 131 246 | www.bass.net.au

Canberra
Playhouse Canberra Theatre Centre
August 23 - 24, 2013
(02) 6275 2700 | www.canberratheatrecentre.com.au

Brisbane
Brisbane Powerhouse
August 27 – September 1, 2013
(07) 3358 8600 | www.powerhouse.org

Sydney
Playhouse, Sydney Opera House
September 3 – 15, 2013
(02) 9250 7777 | sydneyoperahouse.com | Ticketmaster 136 100 | www.ticketmaster.com.au

Tickets $59.00 – $69.00
Booking fees may apply

First Publoished Australian Stage Online- 22/7/2013

Image Credits
Photos – Eric Vizents