Show

Making a show in the first weeks of university was a great experience and opportunity! We jumped right into it! 

Working as a group with people you just met wasn't easy and we had a hard task at hand, which required us to show other groups work. Everybody was a bit unsure of what to do at the start, as having to show work first as a group was quite frightening and we didn't know our limits - what we were allowed to do and what we didn't. But for me that was exciting! Not knowing anybody who is making work for us to show allowed our imagination to flow and expand, as we didn't have any personal connection with the artists. This allowed our show to be fun and a bit disconnected with the work produced and people who made it.

We didn't know each other in our group so it made it harder to communicate as everybody seemed a bit shy and maybe uncomfortable. However we managed really well to overcome this in short space of time - 2 weeks -  to make a show. In two weeks we had to work together as a team but at the same time bonding in the process, finding more about each other and what is everybody interested in. We were all ambitious in our ideas and everybody seemed to enjoy the project. 

The worry and chaos on the last day 4 hours before the show was unbelievable. Everybody was alive and the energy in the room was amazing. We as a group desperately tried to make it work, putting the show together, however the last minute decision that we have made changed everything for the better.  It was very sudden. This makes me think that pressure of time running out as well as the atmosphere in the room with all the groups worry allowed us to make a decision fast which felt right - we were trusting our gut feeling, not like the previous ideas that we had. We ended up putting everybody's work on a CD and attaching balloons to it, which isn't much but that decision was the best we have made. It felt right and that's very important. We planned to set of the balloons from a balcony about 15 minutes into the show. Of course something went wrong (technical problems as usual) and we ended up doing that 20 minutes later than planned. It was intense and our group was panicking! But we managed to pull it through. After the show i was talking to people who came to see it and they loved it! Some of them. One person told me that they loved the anticipation of it all. The waiting of what is going to happen next. All they saw when entering into the studio were blank walls and floor with work nowhere to be seen. It was interesting to observe peoples reactions when they came - some looked disappointed, some intrigued and some confused. When the balloons were set off we all shared a moment of watching it go which was special.

As a group we wanted to make an unusual show and we in my opinion have succeeded as people after the setting off of the balloons were cheering and congratulating us on good work. It wasn't a typical show to make and it was very fun to make too! Although it sounds like we haven't done much work, the decisions and try outs that we have made before hand led to this big decision at the end. Without the time and effort put in and the group work we did we would not have come up with this sudden decision which made our show work.

~Ev