Tramway TV: Born to Manifest film series
A four-part film series by Just Us Dance Theatre responding to their Hip Hop theatre work, 'Born to Manifest' by Artistic Director Joseph Toonga. Performed at Tramway earlier this year, this work illuminates the systematic racial cycles in society and their impact on black British men.
In this series, released over 4 nights on Tramway's Instagram TV channel, different artists have created their own films in response, with their own influences and experiences added to an already layered work.
Each film will be available from 7.30pm.
Part 1 | Wed 23 Sep
A response collaboration from Theophillus Oloyade/Godson & Elliott Banks.
Part 2 | Thu 24 Sep
'HOME': Artists Jade Hackett & Nuna Sandy share their response from a female perspective.
Part 3 | Fri 25 Sep
The first of two response collaborations from Joseph Toonga & Elliott Banks
Part 4 | Sat 26 Sep
The second of two response collaborations from Joseph Toonga & Elliott Banks
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CREDITS
This series was commissioned by Just Us Dance Theatre, and supported by Arts Council England
Part 1
Cinematography & Editing – Elliot Banks
Dancer – Theophillus aka Godson
Concept – Joseph Toonga
Music – Michael Mikey J’ Asante
Producer - Emily Crouch
Support – Harrison Dante, Jazmine Dyer, Ricardo Da Silva
Part 2
Concept – Jade Hackett & Nuna Sandy Response to – Joseph Toonga’s Born to Manifest
Music – Max Ritcher Dream 3 (in the midst of my life)
Cinematography & Editing – Nuna Sandy
Spoken word – Jade Hackett
Son/Husband/Father – Christian Alozie
Mother – Mero Sandy
Wife – Niquelle LaTouche
Daughter – Sahara Sandy
Parts 3 & 4
Cinematography & Editing – Elliot Banks
Dancer / Concept - Joseph Toonga
Music – Michael Mikey J’ Asante
Support – Harrison Dante, Ricardo Da Silva (part 3 only)
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Tramway TV is the online platform for our arts programme, featuring a combination of film, artist conversations, digital performances and online interventions from visual artists and performance makers across Scotland and beyond.
Tramway TV can be accessed on IGTV via our Instagram page.
Tramway TV: Room 2 Manoeuvre - Vinyl Frontier
Finally back in the dance studio for one week, Room 2 Manoeuvre's Artistic Director Tony Mills attempts to chart his journey through the world of dance with his sidekick, Linoleum a.k.a. Lionel, in a residency that is the first stage in a developing new solo piece.
In this video, using hip hop, contemporary dance and physical theatre, join Mills and Lionel as they boldly flow through highs, lows and the unchartered course of one’s passion; embracing success and doing their best to dodge disaster. It’s hip hop, but not as you know it.
With thanks to Chris Devaney from Curious Seed and Dance Base.
About Tony Mills
Tony Mills, who hails from the Orkney Isles, is a founder member of Edinburgh-based Random Aspekts B Boy crew and Cypher Dance. Since giving up veterinary surgery whites for tights, he has worked with Freshmess Dance Company, State of Emergency, Off Kilter, Iron Oxide, Curious Seed, David Hughes Dance Productions, All or Nothing Aerial Dance Theatre, Russian physical theatre maestros Derevo, and the international streetdance show Blaze, which toured worldwide.
His adventures into choreography have seen him assist Ian Spink for Scottish Ballet’s EIF production, Petruska, and undertaking commissions for arts organisations and professional and youth dance companies. He has also worked as a movement director/choreographer in theatre for companies such as Terra Incognita, and commercially for high profile stars such as Martin Garrix and Kelly Rowland.
Tony is a keen ambassador for the breakdance scene in Scotland and has been involved in the production and hosting of major dance events including Castle Rocks Breakdance Championships, the Edinburgh leg of the national Breakin’ Convention tours in 2007-17 and Breakin’ Rules at the Dundee Rep Theatre. Tony continually creates new work for Room 2 Manoeuvre, most recently the international co-production, Without A Hitch.
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Tramway TV is the online platform for our arts programme, featuring a combination of film, artist conversations, digital performances and online interventions from visual artists and performance makers across Scotland and beyond.
Tramway TV can be accessed on IGTV via our Instagram page.
Rajni Perera: Traveller
Open Tuesdays - Saturdays only
*VISITS MUST BE PRE-BOOKED*
Tramway is delighted to present ‘Traveller’, the first exhibition in the UK by multi-disciplinary artist Rajni Perera.
Sri Lanka-born Toronto-based artist Perera’s bold and intricately crafted paintings, sculptures, textile works, and installations explore issues of ancestorship, hybridity, futurity, and identity through the lens of science fiction. Influenced by a range of visual references including Indian miniaturisim, Astro-blackness, paleontology, magical realism, scientific illustration and fashion as well as her personal experiences of migration, Perera’s works evoke alternative histories, new mythologies and possible futures for the diasporic individual. On entering her immersive installations, we encounter vivid, futuristic worlds bought to life by a distinctive visual language which incorporates traditional techniques and crafts such as embellishment, weaving, woodwork and basketry. The ancestral legacies embodied in these techniques are forged into ornate, protective garments which become spiritual suits of armour for an empowered and resilient ‘Traveller’ of the future.
The exhibition ‘Traveller’ encompasses a series of vignettes of a story about the future of humans which positions the diasporic body as the focus of the future. The Travellers and the world/s they inhabit are portrayed across a constellation of works which encompasses meticulously painted portraits, garments, busts and a large statue within an immersive exhibition environment. Together they create a dialogue between past, present and future evoking the sense that we are witnessing museum artefacts from a potential future not yet come to pass.
In addition, the exhibition includes a number of tools and garments conceived to protect the Traveller from a polluted environment following environmental collapse. Three elaborately embellished face masks are displayed on plinths, created in 2019 and described as ‘pollution wear’ they also convey notions of protection and survival being played out in our present moment.
Described by Negarra A.Kudumu in the accompanying text for the first iteration of the Traveller series ‘The Travellers are protected by way of ancestral armour developed for body and spirit, and adapted to fit behaviours of care and nourishment, while facing the dangers of off-world commute, inhospitable terrain, and territorial dispute. These vestments have been produced slowly, in some cases over the course of many centuries. Their mythologies join hands and worlds through bloodlines, through warp and weft, all the way through to the place where the formerly displaced are presently powerful, safe, protected and flourishing.’
This exhibition is funded by Creative Scotland and The High Commission of Canada in the UK, with additional support from Toronto Arts Council and Ontario Arts Council.
About Rajni Perera
Rajni Perera has been exhibited at the Phi Foundation (Montreal, Canada, 2020), Chromatic Festival (Montréal, Canada, 2019), the Museum of Contemporary Art (Toronto, Canada, 2018), The Museum of Modern Art (Rio de Janeiro, Brazil) Art Metropole (Toronto, Canada, 2017), Gallery 44 (Toronto, Canada, 2017), the art Gallery of York University (Toronto, Canada, 2017), the Colombo Art Biennale (Edinburgh, UK, 2017), OTA Fine Arts (Tokyo, Japan 2017), Superchief Gallery (Brooklyn, USA, 2017), the Colombo Art Biennale (Colombo, Sri Lanka, 2016), The Public House of Art (Amsterdam, The Netherlands, 2016), Art Dubai (Dubai, UAE, 2016) and the Art League Houston (Houston, USA, 2014), and other sites. The Art Gallery of Ontario acquired one of her artworks in 2019.
Image: Detail from Rajni Perera, Traveler, 2019
Mixed media on stretched cotton rag stock
40,6 x 20,5 cm (16″ x 12″)
Courtesy of Private collection
Tramway TV: Alberta Whittle
Tramway TV presents two films by Alberta Whittle
In April 2020, with the horrors of Covid-19 overshadowing the everyday, business as usual : hostile environment was developed to reflect the urgency of our times – as simultaneously filled with grief and hope. But most of all, it is an offering and a gesture towards remaining soft in spite of the overwhelmingly hostile environment.
Mammmmmyyyyywaaaata Presents Life Solutions International (2016) centres around a mythological avatar, whose mission is to facilitate mechanisms for discussing decolonisation, abolition, reparations and memory.
About Alberta Whittle
Alberta Whittle is an artist, researcher and curator. She is the recipient of a Turner Bursary in 2020, the Henry Moore Foundation Artist Award and the Frieze Artist Award. She was the Margaret Tait Award winner for 2018/9. Her creative practice is motivated by the desire to manifest self-compassion and collective care as key methods in battling anti-blackness. She choreographs interactive installations, using film, sculpture and performance as site-specific artworks in public and private spaces.
Over 2021, Alberta will be sharing new work as part of British Art Show 9, Glasgow International, Art Night London and the University of Johannesburg.
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Tramway TV is the online platform for our arts programme, featuring a combination of film, artist conversations, digital performances and online interventions from visual artists and performance makers across Scotland and beyond.
Tramway TV can be accessed on IGTV via our Instagram page.
UNCLES: One for the Road
*SOLD OUT*
Please note, these events are rescheduled from their original dates as follows:
From Fri 13 Mar 2020 to Fri 5 Feb 2021
From Sat 14 Mar 2020 to Sat 6 Feb 2021
From Sun 15 Mar 2020 to Sun 7 Feb 2021
Tickets remain valid for the new date and are otherwise unchanged. If the new date does not suit, we will be able to possibly offer a transfer to an alternative date (subject to availability) or refunds once we are re-opened for business as normal.
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Your Uncles, Rab Florence and Iain Connell, Burnistoun, are back for another round of drinks and another round of hilarious comedy as they set the world to rights.
Ages 18+