Tone Line Colour 2007 ink and gouache

There are two lovely places in Snowdonia where you can view my work whilst enjoying great food and drink.

The Cemlyn

and

Bistro Moelwyn

My exhibition of images drawn in performance is now on at Bistro Moelwyn in Blaenau Ffestiniog, where you can also have a very fine coffee and meal. Enjoy!

Drawing with Light: Criw Celf workshop

To view the presentation I gave at the DIVERSE conference 2009, Aberyswyth University, click on:

http://echo360.aber.ac.uk:8080/ess/echo/presentation/f8de5ce6-43a5-4e7e-9624-a3109007b256

To know more about DIVERSE click on:

http://www.aber.ac.uk/diverse/

Here are a selection of the drawings I created during the rehearsal and performances of Skin Deep. Some are done by traditional “eyeballing” methods observational drawing. Others are made by using the visual mixer and projection technology.

I am presenting a paper at the DIVERSE conference:

http://www.aber.ac.uk/diverse

Drawing with Light: an exploration in the use and application of digital projection technologies for the teaching of embodied drawing.

Abstract

I am committed to delivering art workshops and residencies, which are about enabling participants to engage with their creativity through engaging in the processes I use as a professional artist.
On 21st March 2009 I delivered a Masterclass for Criw Celf (Gwynedd Arts Agency) to young people on “Performative Drawing”.

The methods I employ are part of my new practice to marry traditional modes of drawing and contemporary digital technology.

The Masterclass comprised of screening film footage I had made as part of my own work onto a large piece of heavy weight drawing paper. The young people were invited to draw directly onto the paper whist the film was being projected. The projection onto large paper was then repeated, but using a video mixer linked to a camera on an easel (with paper on board). The camera fed into a data projector and whilst drawing took place on the easel paper, the image and the hand doing the drawing was seen in the large projection on the screen. In the re-screening the participants experienced drawing in the film in a different way. It was still a “trace” of a moving image, but done in an entirely new way.

In order to visualise this process please view the film Tone Line Colour on my website: www.mariahayes.info

I will present my findings from the Masterclass using documentation of the workshop and will contextualize the role I see for the use of digital technology in the teaching of traditional drawing.

The performances of Skin Deep took place at Riverfront Arts Centre 5/6 June 2009.

The Wounded Selkie” is an old myth with a contemporary resonance. It speaks of the journey from anger to forgiveness, from prejudice to tolerance and of how we might learn to live alongside the “other”. Visual Art, Music and Dance combine to tell this story in another way and invites’ the audience into a world of emotion and mystery, to look more than “Skin Deep”

This production integrates traditional art forms with digital technologies to develop new possibilities of expression. Each performance has improvised sections and is therefore a unique experience every time.

International collaboration between Wales based (dancer) Paul Davies and (visual artist) Maria Hayes with Portuguese based (dancer) Sandra Moreira and (musician) Pedro Carneiro.

With special thanks to John Thorne for his technical advice and assistence.

Funded by Arts Council of Wales, Visiting Arts with additional support from Rubicon Dance, Cardiff and the Riverfront, Newport.

Some audience feedback:
“You took us on a real journey, I felt very moved”
“I wish I had come last night then I could have come again tonight” - someone who came on Saturday 6 June.

And an email from storyteller Michael Harvey:
“Just to say once more that I really enjoyed the show. The basic projection/movement thing you are doing is really sound and compelling and multi-layered and very human. I think that might be the big difference between what your doing and a lot of other stuff that mixes technology and live performance - you really go into the human aspect of it in a way that works with the intensity of the form.

…. I would like the telling of the story to be a lot more spare so that I can fill the gaps with the stuff that the other art forms are throwing up. I only realized much later that you were having an Yves Klein moment with Sandra on the floor!”

Here are some more images from our recent initial devising process on the performance “Skin Deep”. You can see the performance at Riverfront Arts Centre, Newport on 5th and 6th June 2009 - book early, we are in the small studio and tickets are limited!

We are weaving the work we created in“Vesica Piscis” with new material collected during my Selkie project, “Shedding Skins” to create “Skin Deep”

I am working with technologies to develop a new method of performance drawing. Early experiments are exciting and the integration of the arts is now more possible than ever before. I am primarily a “drawer” and am still committed to the hand drawn image, however, introducing a projection tool is altering and influencing the way I draw. I am intrigued to see how this develops and am considering the possibilities for how we may teach drawing in the future. I will be delivering a masterclass to young and gifted artists soon where I will try out some new ideas.

In addition the dancers are experimenting with how markmaking alters their movements and choreography. We are looking forward to the next phase when Pedro Carneiro joins us. He will be developing a sound scape with new interactive sound technologies. This will have another impact on the work.

The highlights of my education work in 2008/9 include:

• Making four Fairytale books with Foundation Phase children in the Swansea area. The books tell the stories entirely in images and are designed to encourage oracy. The work was exhibited at the Dylan Thomas Centre in Swansea in October 2008. Another project is planned for June/July 2009.

• A residency on Tory Island (Donegal) in July 2008, in connection with my Selkie project. I worked with a group of young people (aged 6 – 28) from the island and we made an exhibition for the festival. The group threw themselves into the project and we made drawings on the rocks at the harbour and at Green Port (where the seals are). We then developed the work into Photoshop montages. The final exhibition had digital prints of the work made outside, prints of the montages and a DVD playing with the soundtrack made up of some of the children singing in Gaelic. Also, a senior member of the community told a native Tory Selkie story, again in Gaelic.

I realise its been a long time since I have updated my news - apologies for this….I’ve been busy!

What have I been up to? Well….

I had a wonderful summer (despite dodging the rain) doing my Selkie project. I went to Cornwall, Ynys Enlli, Tory Island, Donegal and the Isle of Lewis as planned and made work in each location. On Tory I combined my project with workshops for the young people and we made an exhibition for the festival in 10 days.

I have yet to complete the film - every time I had a space to edit I have been ill, so hopfully over the next few months I will bring that to completion. Watch this space!

September brought the news that I had been awarded a scholarship to undertake a practice based PhD in Fine Art at Aberystwyth University. I started late September and am really enjoying the challenge.

As part of my practice I am including my performance and education work.

Paul Davies and I have been awarded further funds to develop “Vesica Piscis” and this month we started work on the next performance, “Skin Deep”

“Skin Deep” is scheduled for showing at Riverfront Arts Centre, Newport on 5th and 6th June 2009. We are performing in the small studio so book early to avoid disappointment!

We are working with Sandra Rosado (dancer) and Pedro Carneiro (musician/composer) from Portugal.

The new work is influenced by my Selkie work and reworks some of the material we explored in “Vesica Piscis” and the film “Tone, Line Colour”.

The next devising period is in April - I will add another update soon.

At the 6.00 pm Sunday services during Lent, Canon Edmund Newell will be joined by comedy writer and performer Andy Hamilton, actors Lynda Baron, Amanda Symonds and Anthony Newell to explore the spiritual dimension of four of the brothers Grimm’s classic fairy stories. During the series we shall be exploring Cinderella, Hansel and Gretel, Snow White and Little Red Riding Hood.

Illustration from Little Red Riding Hood, 2006 by Maria Hayes.

For more information please contact:
Mark McVay
Press Officer
020 7246 8321
mark@stpaulscathedral.org.uk