11th April Performance Day

One Reply to “11th April Performance Day”

1. Hi, I was at the wonderful performance on the 11th and I’ve been thinking about it for a while since. I wanted to put a couple of comments out there just to contribute to the conversation the performance began with me.

   First, many of the narratives of migration were filled with sadness, nostalgia and sometimes loss. I wondered if those emotions had any place in physics? I know there was a discussion of passion for physics, and I would read from this also identity construction because the physicists seemed to define themselves by their science by saying “I was always interested in the way things work” retrospectively defines a trajectory and a journey for them to the point where they are now doing physics. Certainly I have always been excited by the idea of teleportation but when I found out the originating proton dies I was really disappointed and its potential for me was lost. Although my loss was one of naivety I wondered how the physicists felt about the ‘death’ and loss they witness, is anything mourned? Is there a potential trajectory that is no longer possible that is lost?

   Second, I felt throughout the performance one undercurrent of narrative was the privatization of the railways and the more general move from public to private industries. I wondered what it might mean to arrive in a new country where you are subject to racism and skepticism and then to be employed and be given responsibility in one of the biggest national companies? I wondered if this had an impact on feelings of integration and on identity? I suppose that issue speaks to the attempts currently to privatize the NHS which is a destination of many qualified nurses and doctors from the Caribbean.

   I began to think about the parallel in physics and how the privatization of knowledge and intellectual property has both protected scientists and halted the sharing of knowledge and the progress of certain areas.

   Equally there has been a significant erosion of funding for the arts and now more and more artists must apply for corporate funding from privatized organizations to carry out their art. I wondered if more publicly available art was also part of integration (especially with the discussion of the place of the carnival) but I did question what kinds of art I was thinking about as so many forms of art are actually exclusionary in terms of race and class and again this is lost potential. One form many people feel is “not for them” in terms of their experience and class is dance and I think this performance addressed that to an extent which was wonderful to see.

   Congratulations on an enthralling and fascinating piece of work which, as you can see from the above, really got me thinking!

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