Past Event
Access information here
This venue is wheelchair accessible, please ask our Festival Assistants for support upon arrival at the venue. There are no toilets at this venue.
All interpretation panels will be available in large print format in the exhibition space and online here.
There will be a soundtrack to the work
All events will be live streamed in turn on the gallery’s instagram account throughout the course of the evening.
Performances: 7pm, 8pm and 10pm
Aldgate Square
Aldgate High Street
London
EC3N 1AF
Hypnotic twisting and knotting movements and repetitive gestures are performed by dancers in Orbit within the echoes (2021) by Candida Powell-Williams. Set in the green spaces of Aldgate Square, it draws inspiration from labyrinths and the Greek myth of Ariadne, to propose movement as a form of meditation.
Orbit within the echoes is a performance that features 5 dancers in a garden, drawing inspiration from the history and design of labyrinths. The performance explores the association between labyrinths and dancing. Referencing the ways in which movement in these spaces has been written and represented across different cultures, including the Ancient Egyptians, Greeks, Native Americans, Japanese and English.
The choreography also mirrors the myth of Ariadne’s dance as described in Homer’s Iliad,, taking the form of a ring “like the wheel that the potter spins” (Iliad, XVIII), exploring hypnotic coiling and repetitive motion. At times, dancers condense into one amorphous pulsating being playing with symmetry and group mechanics, and, at others, the dancers explore simple acrobatic movements, twisting and knotting together. Tangling and untangling their bodies in space, they use perpetual motion and kaleidoscopic patterns to explore how movement can be meditative. A sound track composed of synthesised recordings of handmade bells and birdsong accompanies the performances.
Candida Powell-Williams
Orbit within the echoes (2021)
Performance, sculptural props and sound, 20 mins
Performers: Mary Feliciano, Anna Guzak, Annie Knobbs, Evie Webzell, Kyle White
Candida Powell-Williams (b. 1984, London) graduated from the Royal College of Art, London in 2011 and the Slade School of Fine Art London in 2009. Her sculptures and performances explore slippages to memory and storytelling over time. They are informed by an exploration of visual patterns and human ways of ordering the chaotic universe, examining the connection between objects, action and belief through a female lens.
Selected exhibitions: Southwark Park Galleries (2022); The Gates of Apophenia, Bosse & Baum London (2019); Command Lines, Void Gallery Northern Ireland (2019); Lessness, still quorum, performance, Serpentine Galleries, London (2018); Boredom and its Acid Touch, Frieze Live, London (2017); Tongue Town, Museum of Modern Art, São Paulo (2017); Cache, Art Night Associate Programme, London (2017); Vernacular History of the Golden Rhubarb, Bosse & Baum Gallery, London (2017); PIC performance festival, Melbourne, Australia (2016); Coade’s Elixir-an occupation, Hayward Gallery, London (2014). Powell-William’s is the recipient of the 2018 Mother Art Prize with a group show at Mimosa House London (2019). She was recently Artist in Residence at The Warburg Institute London and other awards include the Sainsbury Scholarship at the British School at Rome (2012-13), the Paris Residency at Cite Internationale des Arts, (2010), Eric and Jean Cass Sculpture Award (2010-2011). She is represented by Bosse & Baum Gallery London.