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Idle Motion’s ‘Shooting With Light’ Education Pack

Idle Motion create highly visual theatre that places human stories at the heart of their work. Integrating creative and playful stagecraft with innovative video projection and beautiful physicality, their productions are humorous, evocative and sensitive pieces of theatre that leave a lasting impression on their audiences. Facts on the Company

• Idle!Motion!is!run!by!4!Co2Artistic!Directors!2!Grace!Chapman,!Sophie!

Cullen,!Ellie!Simpson!and!Kate!Stanley,!who!met!at!their!Comprehensive!Secondary!School!in!Oxford!in!2004.!

• The!Company!began!in!2007!when!they!started!taking!shows!to!the!Edinburgh!Festival!Fringe.!

• Idle!Motion!are!the!Resident!Ensemble!at!the!New!Diorama!Theatre!and!Associate!Artists!at!the!Oxford!Playhouse.!

• Idle!Motion!are!an!ensemble!company!and!work!collaboratively!with!their!creative!team!to!devise!each!of!their!original!pieces.!!

• ‘Shooting!with!Light’!was!Idle!Motion’s!6th!show.!

Activity: -List 3 images that you saw in ‘Shooting With Light’ and the theatrical devices that the company used to create them. Prompts: -Spanish Civil War: Chorus movement, gun, silhouette lighting from below creates sense of larger crowd. -Photography Dark Room: Red lighting, small space created by blocks, developing tray, camera film negatives. -Morgue: Dark lighting, bodies on stage, use of torch light to symbolise camera, use of Gerda’s pictures projected.!

Activity: -What defines Idle Motion’s style? -List 3 theatre companies that have a similar style. Prompts: -Physical theatre, projection, filmic, props, ensemble, collaboration. -Gecko, DV8, Complicite, Knee High, Frantic Assembly, Rhum & Clay.

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‘Shooting With Light’s’ Inspirations: Photography We began this process wanting to make a show about the history of photography. Since the invention of photography we have collectively taken over 3.5 trillion photographs and most of these have been in the last few decades. It seemed a pertinent time to explore the origins of photography and how our relationship with it has developed over the years. With this in mind our initial idea for the show was for it to be an exploration of the invention of photography, in contrast to the modern proliferation of camera use. Gerda Taro During our research of the history of photography we came across the story of Gerda Taro. It is 1933 Gerta Pohorylle fled Nazi Germany to Paris, France and reinvented herself as Gerda Taro. Discovering the wonder of photography, she fell in love with a fellow refugee who taught her, ‘if your pictures aren't good enough, you aren't close enough’. Together they ventured to the Spanish Civil War and captured the tyranny of fascism. As pioneers of frontline photo journalism, he would go on to receive international recognition as the iconic war photographer Robert Capa - and she would be forgotten.

This was a story we felt really passionate about sharing with wider audiences.

The Mexican Suitcase

Whilst researching Gerda Taro’s legacy we came across the story of the Mexican Suitcase, a suitcase which contained the negatives of Gerda Taro, Robert Capa and David Chim’s work and the only photograph that exists of Capa and Taro together. Robert Capa’s brother Cornell Capa had dedicated his life to finding this missing suitcase and it was finally discovered in the back of a wardrobe in Mexico City in 2007.

This led to the parallel story of Cornell Capa and his search for the missing suitcase.

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We now had 2 main, parallel stories:

One set in the 1930s exploring how Gerda became a photographer, fell in love, forged a partnership with Capa and her tragically died on the frontline. And the second of the two photographer’s legacy: of Cornell Capa’s fight to keep his brother’s work in the public eye and, through this, the discovery of Taro’s work and recognition of her as a photographer in her own right.

A little Background Information:

Gerda Taro

-Born 1st August 1910 in Stuttgart, Germany as Gerta Pohorylle. -August 1933 Gerda was arrested for handing out anti-Nazi leaflets in Leipzig where she was living with her family. -In 1934, due to growing anti-Semitism in Germany, Gerda fled to Paris to join her friend Ruth. -In 1935 Gerda met Andre Friedmann in a café in Paris- he taught her about photography and they fell in love. -In 1936 Gerda and Andre hatched a plan to get their photography and sell more work. They both started selling their works under the name ‘Robert Capa' who they claimed was an American photographer- tapping into the lucrative market for American coverage. -When the real identity of Robert Capa was found out Andre decided to adopt this name permanently. Gerta adopted the name of Gerda Taro to sell her work under, and she eventually took this name as her own. -In 1936 the Spanish Civil War broke out and Gerda and Capa travelled to cover it. -In July 1937, during the Battle of Brunette, Gerda was involved in a crash whilst driving away from the frontline; she would later die from her injuries. -Gerda was given a grand public funeral in Paris by the French Communist Party which was attended by thousands. -Gerda Taro was not recognised fully as a photographer until 2007 when the majority of her work was recovered in a suitcase in Mexico. -In September 2007 the International Centre of Photography in New York housed the first major exhibition of Taro’s work.!

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Robert Capa

-Born October 22nd 1913 in Hungary as Andre Friedmann. -In 1931,at 18, he left home to move to Berlin. -In 1933 he moved from Germany to France, with ambitions to become a freelance journalist. -In 1936, during the Spanish Civil War he became known across the globe for the ‘Falling Soldier’ photo. Since then controversy around the authenticity of the photograph has risen. - After the Spanish Civil War, Capa photographed four other wars: the Second Sino-Japanese War, World War II across Europe, the 1948 Arab-Israeli War and the First Indochina War. -During the Second World War Capa took iconic D-day landing pictures. -In 1947, Capa co-founded Magnum Photos in Paris with David "Chim" Seymour, Henri Cartier-Bresson, George Rodger and William Vandivert. The organisation was the first cooperative agency for worldwide freelance photographers. -He died, May 1954 covering the Indo-China War. -The International Centre of Photography in New York was opened in 1974 by Capa’s brother in order to provide a permanent home for Capa’s work.!

The Mexican Suitcase

-The Mexican suitcase is a small suitcase containing 4,500 35mm negatives of Gerda Taro, Robert Capa and David Chim’s work from the Spanish Civil War.

-It is believed that Capa gave the negatives to his Dark Room manager as he was fleeing the Nazi’s invasion of France. They were passed on to the Mexican Ambassador in France who took them to Mexico City.

- Decades later the Ambassadors nephew discovered them in the back of his dying relative’s cupboard and realised their significance.

-They were passed on to Cornell Capa and the ICP in 2007 and the first exhibition of the work was at the ICP in 2010.!

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Photograph of the Mexican Suitcase of negatives, which we replicate in the show. Activity:

- How is the Mexican suitcase represented on stage? (List two examples)

Prompts: - In the main set: each square corresponds to the squares in the Mexican

suitcase. - In the prop of the Mexican suitcase, which Gerda emerges from at the

beginning of the show. - In a projection of the suitcase in the opening sequence.!

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Activity: How is the passing of time between Gerda and Capa’s death represented? Prompts: -Constant Ensemble movement. -Imagery created by chorus: war, refugees. -News bulletins. -Lighting (back lighting to create silhouettes for both of the deaths. -Underscore of John Hopkins Immunity, creates a feeling of escalation.

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Activity: How does the company show the links between the two story lines? Prompts: -Gerda and Capa stepping into the end of Cornell’s scene when they first arrive in Spain. -Going back in time, seeing Cornell in Capa’s world. -Seeing Gerda through the gauze behind Cornell and June after Cornell says there is very little of Gerda’s work!

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Our Creative Process: Pre-Rehearsal:

• Research ideas on photography, meet up to discuss. Kate Stanley (show director) who brings in the idea of Gerda Taro which we then research, also creating a palette for visuals. We use Pinterest to share visual and set inspiration.

Week One:

• Four artistic directors spend a week with Dan Canham (movement consultant) to workshop visual ideas for the show and create a movement palette for the show.

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Weeks 2-4:

• Four artisitc directors continue to workshop visual ideas, start to set down key plot points and scene ideas. At this point we have two parallel stories: one modern story and Gerda Taro's. We are also rehearsing for a small scratch performance of our work in progress.

Scratch Performance:

• Share the ideas for the show up to this point to an invited audience of around 25 people. We then have an open dialogue with audience members about feedback on the show.

Week 5: • Re-address ideas of show, in reference to Scratch feedback- as a

result of this we cut our modern day narrative and decide to focus on two dual narratives with a focus on Gerda's legacy. Her life, work and love with Capa and Cornell's discovery of the suitcase and her work.

Weeks 6-9:

• Now we have decided on the story we want to tell. We start to identify key plot points within the story. We then approach each plot point differently. At this stage we bring in the actor who plays Robert Capa (Julian Spooner) to workshop ideas with him. Dialogue based scenes are created through a mixture of improvisation and scripts. Improvisations are typed up, then the script is worked on, then put on its’ feet and edited again. Jane Rogoswki (biographer of Gerda Taro) worked with us as a dramaturg, and is particularly helpful in finding Gerda's voice. For the big set movement sequences we work with Dan Canham, drawing on much of the movement palette, which we developed with him in Week 1.

Week 10- Performances:

• At this stage we have most of the scenes in a rough form. Now we start bringing in the technical elements of sound effects, score, set, lighting and projection. The actor for Cornell Capa (Nathan Parkinson) joins the team and starts to develop the character of Cornell, as well as the scenes between June and Cornell's further. We also start running scenes together to see if they work as a whole. We share the work with our creative team and outside eyes such as the New Diorama theatre team and gain feedback. However, as is the nature of devised theatre, we were still making new scenes in the week and tweaking the show throughout our first three week run at the New Diorama Theatre.

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A"Writing"Scheme"for"‘Shooting"With"Light’""The Context What did you watch, who was it by, where and when did you see it? What type of theatre did you see it in? What defines Idle Motion’s style? What did this add to the actor and audience relationship? What narratives did the play follow? How were these stories linked to each other and linked to a theme of the play? What was the effect of having an actor talk directly to the audience? Analysing the tones created by the piece Describe two contrasting moments in the play. How was it engaging? Was it a comic moment? If so, how did they create the comedy? A touching moment … how did they make it touching? Or a sad moment… how did they make it sad? What Images were powerful? How were these created? How did the actors respond to each other? How did they hold themselves physically? What was the emotional tone of their voice? Was there any subtext? Did they use pause or silence? What was their eye contact doing? Analysing the Acting Which one of the actors impressed you the most? How did they show emotion? What did their character add to the narrative? What did they do physically and vocally? Did you empathise with them? Did they change character? How did they telegraph this to an audience? Were they funny? Awkward? Did you feel sorry for them? How did they do this? How did the actors work together as an Ensemble? Explain an ensemble moment which really impressed you? How did they create tension in their voice? What did you read in their body language? Was there subtext used in the scene? Analysing the Lighting and Sound How was lighting used to establish different places and locations? Was it warm or cold? Modern, nostalgic. Larger or intimate? Describe how the lighting with small torches used by the actors was used in the play (e.g. in Capa’s dark room and in the Morgue scene.) What effect did this have? What sound effects did the play use? What effect did this have? Analysing the Set and props How were the different boxes used through out the show. How was the large set with the gauze at the back of the set used? What did it represent? How were different locations created: for example Capa’s flat, train, the ICP? How was projection used? How were the photographs into the play? Final Thoughts What were your overall impressions of the play? What was it that engaged or did not engage you? Subtext?

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Workshop Exercises: !

This is an exercise that we used to think about capturing the feeling of a photograph or memory in our early Research and Development:

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Fading Photographs

Think of different feelings of experiences and physicalise, them for example: bitter lemon, ice cold water, in love, absolute hate, dog tired.

Physicalise this experience, moving from extreme physicalisation to neutral. Count up from one to ten moving from neutral at 0 to extreme physicalisation at number 10.

Then go through fading between different states over different periods of time/ beats.

E.g. -Ice cold water to in love over 5 beats

-Absolute hate to bitter lemon over 30 beats Find 4 tableaus to depict key moments in someone’s life e.g. being born, first day at school, marriage etc. Create the tableaus then start using the same quality of movement to move into the different images. For example: Neutral to being born to neutral to first day at school to neutral to marriage.!

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We used this exercise to create the dark room movement sequence between Capa and Gerda:

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Idle Motion Workshops Our workshops are based around devising theatre and use the same exercises that we used in our own creative process to help students explore creative and playful routes into devised theatre. Our workshops work particularly well with students who have seen our pieces as it helps give an insight into how we created the piece and allows them to have a go at the techniques we use. This encourages them to be more confident and creative theatre makers. In our workshops we draw on skills such as storytelling using verbatim text, puppetry, object manipulation and physical characterisation. However, we prefer not to work on a 'one workshop fits all' basis and are happy to tailor workshops to the current syllabus and requirements of the schools or community groups we work with. For more information on this or any element of the Education Pack please contact Sophie Cullen on sophie@idlemotion.co.uk.

Mark out a small space in which to work within: this is your ‘dark room’. Use your roll of film as your point of focus: both actors must hold the roll at film at all times, and the focus of both actors should be on the roll of film at all times. Actors take it in turns to move within the space with and around the roll of film, creating as interesting shapes as possible. If stuck think of different movement’s you could use using the actions over, beside, through, under, around. How can this be developed? Start developing the actor’s focus not just looking at the film but also catching glances at each other, or out. What is the dramatic tension?

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