I always hated Drama at school and managed to keep it out of my early life by studying and teaching languages. However the forces of destiny were stronger than I was and one day in Stuttgart, Germany I reluctantly accompanied my flat mate to a clowning course where I discovered that I was better at being stupid than clever. Since that evening clowning has been at the core of my work whether in the studio, on the street or the theatre.
My work is a particular (and possibly peculiar) blend of live art, clown, movement, making and activism, and is often developed in collaboration with people from different disciplines and ways of life and with different audiences.
I work with and from personal stories & half-finished conversations, images around me, marks on my body, and things I pick up in the street.
The content of my work centres on the body, identity and gender, geography and belonging, time and food. And walking. I find that most of my work comes from the idea that interrupting patterns – of perception, behaviour, movement, laughter, expectation – has the power to make us see ourselves and others differently.
I have made work in a dining room, a hair salon, a dentists surgery, on a staircase as well as in galleries, theatres and on the street. My work has been described as surreal, enlightening, dream-like, a kaleidescope of surprises, a collage.
I like to make work that blurs boundaries, that treads a fine line between decency and transgression, and encourages us to question, to laugh, to imagine and create new realities.
