2011 for Mercy was the year of the new commission. Supported by an Arts Council grant for the arts, we partnered with top festivals and agencies to present brand new work at the interstice between literature, fine art and popular culture. Here they are!
Overlap is a programme of new performance commissions exploring the shared territory across writing/music/performance, kicking off at AND Festival, at our Spectre of Spectacle event.
As well as a great set from hauntological musician Maria Minerva, the Spectres of Spectacle event featured
a new performance from Anat Ben David, called turn your radio on (pictured)
a new performance from Victoria Gray, called Vessel
plus
Ground Rhythms, 3 newly commissioned tracks from Forest Swords, which were set for performance by Samizdat. This in turn spawned an awesome unique art-print from Nathan Walker, which you can see in its interactive digital form here, plus new work by Sam Riviere who was joined by Crispin Best on the livestream chat when we re-streamed the performance in November - made into this vid.
In partnership with the Chapter and Verse festival, we produced new work for the public address system at the Bluecoat, where we integrated the usual annoucements into a glitched mashup of computer and real voices - Uncanny Valley, by experimental writers Holly Pester and Nathan Jones - and curated an event of new responses to the title Electronic Voice Phenomena, featuring Holly Pester, Soriah, and new commissions from Nathan Jones, Mark Leahy and Emma Bennett.
[some video and audio from Electronic Voice Phenomena here, and a conversation between Mark Greenwood, Mark Leahy and myself here]
In partnership with ReDock and Glitch Karaoke we presented a double header at Elevator studios, including a brand new commission from Ross Sutherland where he delivered a new lyric poem based on a loop of the Fresh Prince of Bel-Air intro, which went on to scratch and new work development with the Barbican.
In partnership with Liverpool Music Week, we presented two new commissions at CUC
A SPY VANDERUNG INEM VILDNESS by Steven J Fowler and Ben Morris [video]
and INFINITE LOVE (for guitar orchestra) by Dustin Wong and Jon Davies
Throughout Overlap, and generally around and about, we also showcased version one of our new peice of software, a collaboration with visual wizz Sam Meech, provisionally entitled Live Writing, which allows us to produce live-written animated text projections. As well as our own events, we piloted this project around the North - including an AMAZING night bouncing at Article magazine's Drumro[ll] rave, with Black Dog and Sandwell District.
Finally, we saw our first phase of the Young Pines programme come to fruition with a splendid, truly NSFW exhibition of prints, audio and text at LJMU Art School gallery.
We've also been plotting behind the scenes on an installation with Laurence Payot, a new internet comic with Luke Kennard and Kathyrn Cooper, a digital artwork with Scott Spencer, and a massive 48 hour performance from Mark Greenwood, as well as continuing to support for new work from Ross Sutherland, Emma Bennet, Nathan Jones, Sam Meech, and the Young Pines... AND big plans with our London chums Penned in the Margins...
Bring it on 2012.
Supported by National Lottery through Arts Council England Grants for the Arts
and Ronald Duncan Literary Foundation