Working the Middle Ground: Making Bodies in Flight's Performance Walk, Dream-work

Dream →Work is an ambulant audio performance project created by Bodies in Flight (2009 -12). Originally concerned with how public space is animated by multiple performances that interweave the public and the private, the personal and political, the normative and the imagined, each new manifestation of the work increasingly came to focus on how public space articulates local histories with lived memories. It has been performed in Singapore, Nottingham, Bristol, Wirksworth, and Skegness. As artists, the performers are only ever visitors who walk the middle ground through the city without occupying it, in contrast to the locals who occupy the middle ground as their home, invested in its practical and ideological structures. The artists’ method of manifold re -tracing of inhabitants’ habituated behaviours and routes in rehearsal and performance has forced a disclosing of the relations between corporeality, identity, and the urban environment. This chapter explores, as a dialogue between co -directors Sara Giddens and Simon Jones, the project’s development from stepping over the middle ground of the daily commute to dwelling in the lived histories of place, by charting its different local manifestations and proposing ways in which the artists’ passing through can open out potential spaces for reflection from both within and outside the middle ground of the everyday use of public space. Resumo: Sonho →Trabalho é um projeto ambulante de performance sonora criado pelo grupo Bodies in Flight (2009 -2012). Originalmente concentrada na forma como o espaço público é animado por múltiplas performances que misturam o público e o privado, o pessoal e o político, o normativo e o imaginado, cada nova manifestação da obra centrou -se cada vez mais na forma como o espaço público articula histórias locais e memórias vividas. Foi apresentada em Singapura, Notthingham, Bristol, Wirksworth e Skegness. Enquanto artistas, os performers são apenas visitantes que atravessam o espaço intermédio pela cidade sem o ocuparem, em contraste com os habitantes locais, que ocupam o espaço intermédio como seu lar, investido nas suas estruturas práticas e ideológicas. O método dos artistas de retraçar muitas vezes os comportamentos e rotas dos habitantes em ensaios e espetáculos conduz a uma revelação das relações entre a corporalidade, a identidade e o ambiente urbano. Este capítulo explora, na forma de ANIMATION OF PUBLIC SPACE THROUGH THE ARTS 144 um diálogo entre os codiretores Sara Giddens e Simon Jones, o desenvolvimento do projeto desde a passagem pelos espaços intermédios dos itinerários quotidianos até à abordagem das histórias vividas do sítio, mapeando as suas diferentes manifestações locais e propondo formas como a passagem dos artistas pode abrir espaços potenciais para reflexão tanto no interior como no exterior do espaço intermédio da utilização quotidiana do espaço público. Dream → Work, an ambulant audio performance project, was originally concerned with the morning rush hour and the daily ways in which we make and unmake our selves in the journey to work. Created by Bodies in Flight (U.K.), it has been performed in Singapore, Nottingham, Bristol, Wirksworth and Skegness. As visitors, the performers walk the middle ground through the city without occupying it: their responses are at once too big and too small, too general and too specific for the place, in contrast to the locals, who habitually occupy the middle ground as their home, invested in its practical and ideological structures. As artists, the manifold re -tracing of the inhabitants’ habituated behaviours and routes in rehearsal and performance forced a disclosing of the relations between corporeality, identity, and the urban environment, moving from ideas of transnational, transferable labour, to locally embodied memories of place. This in turn led to subsequent manifestations of the project, for instance, at the Wirksworth Festival (2011) and SO Festival (Skegness, 2012), which focused increasingly on a form of dialoguing with inhabitants in order to incorporate their voices into the work. This chapter explores this project’s arc of development from stepping over the middle ground of the daily commute to dwelling in the lived histories of place. We chart the development of the performance -walk through its different local manifestations, proposing ways in which the artists’ passing through can open out potential spaces for reflection from both within and outside the middle ground of the everyday use of public space.