Archived News (until Spring 2011)

Archived News - what we have been doing...Spring 2011 - 2006

Happy New Year everyone! Modelworks is back at Leeds Art Gallery on the following dates, with yet more wonderful model-led working. Drop-in, free of charge but donations welcome! We will be focusing more on drama and the Gallery's collection this term.

Saturday 22nd January, 1-4pm
Saturday 12th February, 1-4pm
Saturday 12th March, 1-4pm - family afternoon in the Gallery space as part of International Women's Day
Saturday 26th March 1-4pm

Also at the Leeds Gallery, Nina Kane will be collaborating on performative and gender aspects of Sarah Kane's Cleansed with model and artist Paul Ashton. She will be working again on the same piece with a female model in March. Life-drawers and anyone with an interest in theatre, feminism or performance art are very welcome to participate - just drop-in.

Saturday 5th February, 10am - 4pm
Sunday 6th February, 1-4pm

Saturday 26th February, 10am - 4pm
Sunday 27th February, 1-4pm

A big thank you to Leeds Art Gallery Education for their support.

Autumn 2010

Art of the Life-Model - Modelworks at Leeds Art Gallery

Exciting news on the project - we are back, bigger and better than ever before at Leeds Art Gallery but this time with a new look and a new name! From Autumn 2010, The Art of the Life-Model will be known as Modelworks, and offers a vibrant new programme of fortnightly model-led life-drawing at Leeds Art Gallery.

The Art of the Life-Model has an excellent profile in the Leeds art scene and has brought over a 1,000 visitors into the gallery since its inception in October 2002. The work developed from the WILMA - Women Into Life-Modelling Arts pilot project 'Will You, Won't You...Join the Dance?', and was developed by Nina Kane of Cast-Off Drama in partnership with Leeds College of Art Community Education and Leeds Art Gallery Education until 2008. Since 2008, it has been run by Cast-Off Drama in partnership with the Gallery and supported almost entirely by volunteer donations and an active and committed group who have developed grassroots exhibitions in Leeds City Centre in response to the varied and experimental programme of model-led activities. The activities have fused drama, art history and life-drawing as a way of reading the collection and have effected many interventions in the life-drawing arena, and in the spaces of the Gallery.

Modelworks represents a new departure for the interventionist and experimental philosophy and practices of The Art of the Life-Model. Addressing more fundamentally the practice of life-drawing education we aim to programme a series of workshops on specific items from the collection exploring conventions of nudity, time, stillness, silence and fixed positions. Our work will examine the history of the life-model through interventions in the practice of the artform, and through exchanges with drawers in the space of the gallery and in the education studio. Our practice seeks new understandings of the formal elements, of colour, of perspective and anatomy and will be taught by models giving a different 'take' on ways into these practices. The workshops will offer sustained model-led drawing, challenging preconceptions and allowing new life into the space of image-making.

Also new to the project will be a number of Family Afternoons where visitors to the Gallery with children can come and draw from a costumed model working in the gallery space from selected pictures and sculptures.

The workshops are free of charge, but as we are still seeking funding, any voluntary donations will be gratefully received - materials provided. Workshops start Saturday 25th Sept, 1-4pm and will run on the following dates. For further info, contact us on 07800 861351 or contact Nina Kane: ninakane@btinternet.com

Modelworks -
Leeds Art Gallery

Saturday 25th September, 1-4pm - Life-Drawing
Saturday 9th October, 1-4pm - Life-Drawing
Saturday 23rd October, 1-4pm Family Afternoon - Costume Drawing in the Gallery Space
Saturday 6th November, 1-4pm - Life-Drawing
Saturday 20th November, 1-4pm - Life-Drawing
Saturday 27th November, 1-4pm - Life-Drawing
Saturday 11th December, 1-4pm Family Afternoon - Costume Drawing in the Gallery Space

Hope you can make it!

Work continues on Sarah Kane's 'Cleansed'...

Artistic Director Nina Kane will be collaborating with Paul Ashton on our ongoing exploration of Sarah Kane's 'Cleansed'. Life-drawers invited. Watch this space for details of date and time once confirmed soon (everyone's on holiday!).

We recommend.....
If you're heading up to Edinburgh this year check out The Paper Birds (www.thepaperbirds.com) who will premiere their visual, political exploration of women as Other and ‘Other’ women at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe this August. 'Others' 4th-29th August, Pleasance Courtyard. Box Office:0131 556 6550
"Based on a six month exchange of letters and emails with an Iranian artist, a prisoner and a celebrity, The Paper Birds deconstruct the stories and voices of women from east and west, from different sides of the television screen and different sides of the law. Through live music, movement, verbatim text and audience input, ‘Others’ questions if it is possible to better understand 3 absent women or indeed ourselves".
Massive respect to The Paper Birds for this work!

We also recommend Clean Break Theatre's 'This Wide Night' coming to the Soho Theatre London in November. Again, massive respect to this theatre company and the work it does!

Ocarina Nina Street-Theatre

The Singing Secretary and Fiona Folk had a very rainy but wonderful time at the Larmer Tree Festival and sang to many friendly punters and the odd peacock! We then had an unforgettable weekend at Indie Tracks and had fun on the Steam Train! The Singing Secretary even appeared on the Winkball Indietracks film....we will be back at Indie Tracks next year! Such an amazing festival! Roll on Solfest!

The Collection Grows...

Cast-Off Drama's eclectic and highly subjective Gallery of collectable works for inspiration, exhibition, contemplation and project-working now includes:

'The Stain' - a chapbook by Tracey Emin, produced at the Venice Bienniale, 2007

Three hand-painted ceramic tiles by Paula Rego, including 'L'Escultora' - a particular favourite due to its connection to Leeds Art Gallery's 'The Artist in Her Studio' which we have worked from many-a-time in our projects (yes, we've already used this tile on a poster!), circa 1989-1993

An oil on board - Two Dogs by L.S Lowry

A watercolour sketch by L.S Lowry, 1953

Two large and cheeky signed posters of Gilbert and George's 'Dirty Words' retrospective at the Serpentine in 2002 - 'Are you angry or are you boring?' (such an excellent question!) and 'Fuck'. We love Gilbert and George!

A rare electronic piece of 9 frames which compose a Gilbert & George picture when printed from the internet...we like this, everytime you send it to someone they own an original art and its capitalist value thus slowly depreciates through mass production and circulation...beautiful!

A Marina Abramovic coffee set from the Illy Artist range, circa 2002 - unfortunately two of the saucers are the same - that's mass production for you!

A sculpture of a ballerina in resin by Andrea Carlo Lucchesi, circa early 1900s

'The Departure' - an oil on canvas by William Powell Frith (or circle), late C19th - we think we've found the inspiration for this in a letter written by a woman about a P&O ferry....we are creating from this already and will be taking a trip to the National Conservation Centre in Liverpool for their advice on looking after this soon.... (check them out at www.liverpoolmuseums.org.uk/conservation)

A gouache on cartridge paper by Patrick Heron, 1966 - lots of beautiful reds, oranges and the odd pink with white space around it....but could it be a fake? We're not sure on the provenance of this but we like the colours and thought we'd take a risk!

A limited edition Christmas card by Tracey Emin called 'Robin Sez', 2002 - yes friends, you will be receiving a copy of this for the yuletide season (so predictable) - it's beautiful!

A hand-painted 'Harvest' jug designed by Frank Brangwyn

Soup bowl, plate and hand-painted dish by Brangywn

Two C19th woodblock prints by Utagawa Hiroshige - 'Ishiyama Temple on Lake Biwa, Omi Province, 7th Lunar Month 1853' and 'Takashi Beach, Izumi Province, 7th Lunar Month 1853' from his collection 'Views of the Sixty-Odd Provinces'.

Limited edition print of a Jacob Kramer portrait, 1935. We think this is one of his sister Sarah.

A rare, black-edged, brightly painted cup, saucer and bowl from Gray's pottery, 1929 - we believe this to be painted by Dorothy Tomes who was there between Susie Cooper and Clarice Cliff....we're interested in the missing history of this little-known designer and love the black creeping into the bright colour...we like the foreboding in it and its historical prescience (but then we are Smiths listeners....)The ceramics are visually stunning!

An eighteenth century portrait of a formidable unknown woman (whose husband got sold separately...we were tempted to keep them together, but couldn't afford it! Our thinking was - if they were happy together in life they will be reunited somewhere happily in spirit in the Great Beyond and won't need their pictures to stay a pair - if unhappy together in life, she might well be quite happy to go on her separate way and have new stories created from her image!)

A strange, C18th Italian oil of three ships with a Swiss flag....it looked a bit like the Nina, the Pinta and the Santa Maria but it's not....

Four Henry Moore lithographs with drawings and hand-written notes on both sides of his designs for the UNESCO scuplture, circa mid-1950s

A Henry Moore lithograph of some sheep

Three beautiful lithographs by Marc Chagall

A wonderful oil painting of a horse and rider signed and attributed to Jack B Yeats - a sketch in oils of his later work 'The Whistle of the Jacket'. This is almost certainly a fake, but it's a very old and a very good one nonetheless!

Two coronation mugs painted a month apart by Dame Laura Knight - one celebrating Edward VIII's coronation and a swiftly reworked version for George V - both May 1937. We just loved the elephants on them and Knight's quirky design!

A small late oil painting on hard-board by L.S. Lowry, of a solitary man and dog, with an inscription on the back from him which says 'As promised', 1967. We believe this to be one of the many paintings Lowry did for friends, associates or maybe even creditors in his later years! Absolutely stunning!

A beautiful early oil painting of a little girl called Beatrice, painted by Ely de Vescovic (later known as Bettina Whitman) in 1926. De Vescovic collaborated with Diego Rivera on his murals and is famous for developing a new chemical process for fixing paint.

We are busy contemplating these wonderful works and writing, dreaming, performing short bursts of ideas and impulses in response to them. We will be writing a collection of scripts from these objects in forthcoming months and will begin working from them in 2011. We will also be printing postcards! Our art auction coffers are now firmly depleted and we won't be adding any more to the collection as we've no wall space!

The Art of the Life-Model, Summer Term

The Art of the Life-Model did some wonderful work in the Gallery and we very much enjoyed exploring Henry Moore's 'King and Queen', Sean Scully's exhibition, Mark Dean's The Byrds / THe Birds, Robert MacBride's 'Woman Seated at a Window', Francis Bacon's Untitled and the Hermann Obrist exhibition. The project has come a long way in 8 years and we will update you as to its future when news of funding is confirmed.

Collections....

We are building a collection of art from which to make theatre, and are excited to announce the purchase of three rather wonderful pieces.

The first is a Victorian oil painting called The Departure and is attributed to William Powell Frith. It is literally a picture of a ship about to 'cast-off' as throngs say goodbye to their loved ones or jump on board for a new life somewhere over the ocean. An appropriate start to the Cast-Off Collection! We'll be making a group theatre piece from this...watch this space!

The second and third purchases are limited edition ceramic tiles hand-painted by our favourite artist Paula Rego! Our production-goers and Art of the Life-Model regulars will know we often return to Paula Rego's amazing and powerful oeuvre, and we are passionate about her work! The tiles are painted in yellow-orange and blue on white. THe first shows a woman carrying a guitar with a peacock, a dog at her feet and a horse or cat creature hurrying towards her. The second shows a woman - possibly the same one - rowing a boat across the water with a peacock and a great dog / pig/bear figure sitting in the boat! We reckon they're painted in the early 90s! Nina will be making a solo piece from these for this year's Summer school...watch this space!

Friends of Cast-Off Drama will be receiving postcards of these in the not-too-distant future.....!

We love these works and are looking forward to making theatre from them and sharing them with you all!

The Roads
Cast-Off advises you all to check out the hot new sound of London-based band The Roads. This group of 5 sisters are excellent musicians and have launched some tasters of their forthcoming album on My Space - www.myspace.com/theroadslondon. Tour dates soon. Ones to watch! We love them!

Art of the Life-Model updates:
We want your postings! Art of the Life-Model is now featured on the Leeds Art Gallery wikipedia page - regulars: please add any useful observations of your experience and learning over the years, and its contributions to the Leeds art community, and any ongoing research generated from it to that, please!

The Art of the Life-Model is undergoing changes, and will be working in two forms from this point on. We are developing an education programme of taught courses in contemporary life-model studies at the Leeds Art Gallery, synthesising much of the theory and findings of recent years. These courses will be unaccredited, but we want to develop a continuous group who can commit to each session. A 6-week pilot course will run from the end of May - more details to follow.

Separate from this, we will be developing Art of the Life-Model Community which will involve Summer programmes of experimental, theatre-based modelling, exhibitions and continuation of the Green Children of Wolfpit work, subject to funding being obtained. Watch this space for this Summer's shindigs!

We are also setting up a Facebook page for Art of the Life-Model regulars to keep up with each other! Hope you'll join it!

The Singing Secretary and Fiona Folk are now finalising their round of Summer bookings. We will be appearing at the Golcar Lily Festival in Huddersfield on Saturday 8th May, also:
Larmer Tree Festival, 15th - 18th July
Indie Tracks, 25th - 27th July
Solfest, 27th - 30th August.

Please note: we are not The Singing Secretary that appears on YOUtube in a bedroom - that's a different singer! We are the one outdoors, with a hat!

Apology:
To all who signed up for the recent Friends' scheme for the delay in receiving your packs - badges and postcards are being made as we speak and will be winging their way to you in due course.

Spring 2010
The Art of the Life-Model at Leeds Art Gallery -dates for this season are as follows:
30th & 31st January, 1-4pm
20th & 21st February, 1-4pm
13th & 14th March, 1-4pm
3rd & 4th April, 1-4pm

Summer dates to follow.

We are continuing with our work on The Green Children of Wolfpit...watch this space for news on this!

The Art of the Life-Model­ at Leeds Art Gallery- pedagogic and performati­ve strategies­ in community arts education

Where: SEPD Conference, University of Huddersfield
When: 9th March 2010
The Art of the Life-Model has run as a community arts 'drop-in' at Leeds Art Gallery since 2002. It offers members of the public an opportunity to explore the gallery's collections and exhibitions through mixed-arts activity combining drama, life-drawing, art history, 3-D making, discussion and performance. The Art of the Life-Model is unique in its focus on the history, practice and politics of life-modelling and takes a theatre approach to the arena of life-drawing and also the space of the gallery. It offers learning space for people of all backgrounds, abilities and ages, and is unusual in its combination of theory and practice at community level. The session will present findings by Nina Kane from research undertaken whilst the course ran through the Leeds College of Art, and subsequently as a theatre and Gallery Education project under Cast-Off Drama.

I'm happy to provide a copy of the lecture notes to anyone interested after the event for connected research.

Autumn 2009

Administrator wanted...
Cast-Off Drama is looking for a part-time administrator to complete funding bids for our next major education project (The Art of the Life-Model - 'Green Children of Wolfpit'), and to further develop the administrative and marketing structure of the company. The role would suit somebody with good communication skills, able to be self-motivated, interested in small arts development and in gaining more experience in an innovative, established, public arts company. Location: Cast-Off Drama Studios, Bates Mill Artspace, Huddersfield. For expressions of interest or any further details, please contact Nina Kane (Artistic Director) on 07800 861351 or ninakane@btinternet.com

New Script Work - 'Panoptican'

Cast-Off's new youth script is now under way and looks at issues of motherhood.

In a world of watching and being watched, where random unpremeditated violence and vermin roam the streets, and 'Death by Disrespect' angels scour the empty buildings in the latest Life-Bored game, the Panoptican glistens as a Beacon of Hope to all who fall foul of the Acts of Gross Indecency. A group of young single mothers, committed to the Pan for wellbeing, guidance and tenderising, live out a life of virtual motherhood as their babies bloom amongst them in the nursery. All is as it should be until Rapunzel cuts her hair, and the glass in the baby room cracks...

Watch this space for more news on the Panoptican and emerging young peoples' projects.

The Art of the Life-Model at Leeds Art Gallery
Our regular programme of model-led mixed arts workshops is back for another fantastic session, and this year we are doing weekends! It's still a 'drop-in', and you can come either day of the weekend or both. Each session is based on a work in the Gallery's collection. They involve drama, drawing, 3-D making, performance, storytelling, movement, percussion and discussion! Work this term is towards a collaborative, devised, open-art production / showing of mixed work starting in January and due to happen next Summer. Its theme is the Green Children of Wolfpit (Woolpit)- a fantastic tale that could take us in any direction! More on this later. Dates for Autumn 2009 and Spring 2010 (yes, that's a decade since the Millenium!!!) are below, Summer dates later in the year, watch this space! Contact Cast-Off for further details (07800 861351 / ninakane@btinternet.com )

12th & 13th September, 1-4pm
3rd & 4th October, 1-4pm
24th & 25th October, 1-4pm
14th & 15th November, 1-4pm
5th & 6th December, 1-4pm
9th & 10th January, 1-4pm
30th & 31st January, 1-4pm
20th & 21st February, 1-4pm
13th & 14th March, 1-4pm
3rd & 4th April, 1-4pm

A big thank you to the hard-working staff at the Gallery!

Exhbition, Leeds Central Library, 7th - 27th September
A massive well done and thank you to Christine Hinchliffe and all the Art of the Life-Model participants who have created such a fantastic exhibition at Leeds Central Library Artspace (2nd floor). It is the second year such an exhibition has happened and is organised autonomously by Art of the Life-Model participants. The current exhibition features works by 12 artists showing works created from and inspired by 2008 and 2009 Gallery sessions. This year's exhbition also features works developed from Cast-Off's other projects - Bride-Cake Bride-Bones and I Love To You - and shows a real range of styles, thoughts, methods, techniques, responses and ideas. Beautiful, beautiful works! Catch it before it goes!

Cast-Off Drama Friends SchemeIntroduced by our Artistic Director Nina Kane
In a bid to wrestle with the current economic climate we find that public and community-funding is thin on the ground and we are as ever looking for creative ways to generate income to support our public-friendly and non profit-making arts events! Though penniless, we are, nonetheless popular! In light of this(and making a virtue of necessity) we are happy to announce our Friends Scheme! If you have benefitted from our work in the past and would like to see it continue, please, please join it! Details below. Thank you.


'Friends of Cast-Off Drama' costs £10 a year to join. Membership benefits include:
Your own exclusive Cast-Off Drama badge
Limited edition Cast-Off Drama postcards (beautiful designs)
Huge discounts on any paying workshops and events
Ongoing news and updates, including quarterly newsletter on Cast-Off Drama projects and other life-drawing groups and events in the region
Invitation to Cast-Off Drama social events and day-trips for 'Friends'
Entry to all free events, as now, but with the knowledge that your support is helping them to continue!
Your support is invaluable and at less than a £1 a month it's a real bargain (and is considerably cheaper than if we have to start charging per session!)

To join, please make out a cheque or postal order for £10 to Cast-Off Drama and send it to: Friends of Cast-Off Drama, 133 Leas Ave, Holmfirth, West Yorkshire, HD9 3EW. If you would like to pledge to join and pay Nina in cash at a session or event, please e-mail us and we will prepare you a membership pack!

I Love To You
Our Summer programme is now complete, and what a wonderful time we had at Bates Mill! Wonderful discussions, exchanges, drawing, painting, photographs, contemplation, poetry, struggles, questions and the making of new friends...thank you to all who came! We will be back!

Summer 2009

I Love To You Cast-Off Drama Summer Sessions
We are offering a unique series of figurative sessions this Summer to life-drawers, models, thinkers and anyone with an interest in performance art and feminism. Working from our beautiful life-drawing studio at Bates Mill, Huddersfield, we will perform a series of life-drawing days taking inspiration from the writings of feminist and philosopher Luce Irigaray. The workshops offer readings and embodyings of Irigaray's work in an open and contemplative environment and are model-led. Readings will provoke sustained and gestural poses for an inspirational day of drawing, painting or 3-D making. Some materials provided, but feel free to bring your own. Refreshments also provided. We can offer wall-space and floor space to work on, and temporary storage of art produced for the Summer season. We offer a sliding scale of costs payable on the day, but it would be great if you could book in advance just to help us plan for numbers. Each session is self-contained, so come as and when you can, and choose the dates that work for you.

Dates & Times:
Tuesday 21st July, 10am - 4pm
Monday 27th July, 11am-5pm
Monday 3rd August, 10am - 4pm
Wednesday 5th August, 10am - 4pm
Saturday 8th August, 10am-4pm
Monday 10th August, 10am - 4pm
Wednesday 12th August, 11am - 5pm
Tuesday 18th August 10am-4pm
Wednesday 19th August, 10am - 4pm

Cost per day:
£6 - general ticket (average-earners)
£5 - concessions -students, unemployed, oaps, part-timers, etc.
£10 -'high-earners'- for anyone earning over £45,000pa

Money in the pot on entry please! We won't be asking to see any documents, but please claim concession if you need it or give more if you can afford it!

There is lift-access for wheelchair users or anyone with restricted mobility, with prior arrangement (please telephone 07800 861351 / 01484 685948 or e-mail: ninakane@btinternet.com with 48-hours' notice to let us know). There is a level-access toilet.

All ages welcome, but under-16s need to be accompanied by an adult.

To book, contact Nina Kane on 07800 861351 or at ninakane@btinternet.com. For details on the Artspace at Bates Mill visit www.batesmill.co.uk .


Cleansed by Sarah Kane
From July, Cast-Off will research staging options for Sarah Kane's 'Cleansed' using life-model, performance art and other theatre of the body methods in production. The performance will be developed at Bates Mill. Watch this space for cast and set-design opportunities.

Festival Appearances! Ocarina Nina Street-Theatre & Singing is very happy to announce that the Singing Secretary and Fiona Folk will be hitting the festival circuit this Summer. We had a year off last year to re-charge batteries and to learn some new songs, but the bookings are rolling in and we are excited to be back! Catch us at the following and check their websites for details!

May 22nd - 24th: Off the Tracks Spring Festival - www.offthetracks.co.uk
The Singing Secretary and Fiona Folk will both be appearing here!

June 13th: Leamington Peace Festival - www.peacefestival.org.uk
Fiona Folk will be crooning peaceful tunes at this, the longest-running free festival in Britain

June 14th: Holmfirth Arts Festival - www.holmfirthartsfestival.co.uk
The Singing Secretary will be appearing at this. It is the second year of the festival, and promises to be an exciting line-up.

June 26th - 28th: Glastonbury 2009 - www.glastonburyfestivals.co.uk
Our first Glastonbury appearance for The Singing Secretary and Fiona Folk. It was amazing and we will be back next year!!!

July 24th - 26th: Indie Tracks Festival, Butterley, Derbyshire - www.indietracks.co.uk Indie-pop joy along the sides of a steam railway!

August 21st - 23rd: Beautiful Days Festival, St Mary's Ottery, Devon
www.beautifuldays.org - We are looking forward to another trip down the Sunny South -West to this festival organised by thye Levellers

August 28th-30th: Solfest 2009 - www.solwayfestival.co.uk
Bank Holiday sunshine on the banks of Silloth! Both The Singing Secretary and Fiona Folk will be appearing here!

September dates being confirmed as we write including Lumb Farm and Barnsley Pride - watch this space!


'Making' Opportunity for Environmental Artist
Cast-Off have an opening for an environmental artist (or artists?) to develop a large-scale structure for outdoor performances and workshops next Summer. We can provide making space, all materials and endless tea and biscuits from September onwards. Contact us on 07800 861351 if interested.

Bride-Cake Bride-Bones

Bride-Cake Bride-Bones directed by Eluned Murphy, written by Nina Kane.

'Ev'ry step you take, Evr'y move you make, that’s right, you know how it goes . . . ' Dark and Bold, cold and present, Bride-Cake Bride-Bones is a sweeping whirlwind of a tale. Under the constant leer of the Poleeesze a recluse wonders whether she will ever find her son and a stale love affair returns to haunt its owners. Love, loss and jealousy haunt its bejewelled quarters. This is the place where drama, technology, lemons and a reincarnated Iguana collide.

Thursday 30th April 7:30pm
Sunday 3rd May 5:30pm
Milton Festival of Theatre, Milton Studio, University of Huddersfield.

Eluned Murphy's fantastic adaptation of the second act will be presented at the Milton Studio Theatre, University of Huddersfield.
Contact: miltonboxoffice@hud.ac.uk for info and bookings. See postings below for details of Cast-Off Drama's work on this play.

Textual Revolutions, University of Stirling, 8th & 9th May 2009

Nina Kane will discuss the script development of Bride-Cake Bride-Bones and Cast-Off Drama's scripting processes as a whole in a paper for the University of Stirling's Textual Revolutions conference this May. The paper will form part of a plenary on New Textualities and is entitled:
The Theatre of the Life-Model - an interdisciplinary arts approach to creating new scripts for performance. For further details of the conference, contact Steven Craig at the Dept. of English Studies, University of Stirling: steven.craig1@stir.ac.uk

The Art of the Life-Model Sculpture on a Saturday!

Henry Moore once said that sculpture is the most dramatic of all the fine arts due to the emotions evoked by its 3-dimensional form. Well, we will shall be elaborating on this idea in our own special way with another fantastic season of free public art workshops at Leeds City Art Gallery exploring the role of the model in the creation of figurative art. Workshops will investigate the sculptures of Nimptsch, Rodin, Canova,Gormley, Chadwick and others through drama, life-drawing and exploring the space and collections of Leeds City Art Gallery. And if the weather's sunny we will work outside in Victoria Gardens so there's still a chance to tan whilst you soak up the sculpture! (We need all the sunshine we can get in Leeds after all!). Sessions are on a 'drop-in' basis and are free of charge, but a small donation towards tea and biscuits is always appreciated! A big thank-you as ever to the hard-working staff at Gallery Education and on the gallery 'floor' for their support.

Work from these sessions can also go towards the Art of the Life-Model exhibition currently being organised by participants in the course. Contact Christine Hincliffe for further details on cdhinchliffe@hotmail.com (see posting below).

The 7 sessions are on Saturdays, 1-4pm on the following dates:
2nd, 16th, 30th May
13th, 20th June
11th, 25th July

Singing Lessons:

Cast-Off Drama offers one-to-one and group singing lessons at Bates Mill. The sessions are designed to build confidence and to develop your repertoire in a range of singing styles. Complete beginners and more advanced equally welcome!
Ring 07800 861351 for further details.

News from our friends...The Singing Secretary and Fiona Folk on the Festival Circuit this Summer

Please note: We are not the Singing Secretary that appears on YouTube - That's a different singer!

News from elsewhere...
We have long wanted to take life-drawing to the world of festivals, but somehow never got round to it. We were very pleased therefore to see at our recent Glastonbury visit a woman doing life-modelling in a tent in the Healing Area! Perhaps we'll get roind to it and join her next year! The joys of mixing theatre and life-drawing seem to be in the air this Summer and we've spotted two new initiatives that seem well worth checking out and attending if you are in the area! The first is London Drawing who are running theatrical life-drawing days at Battersea Arts Centre in London, also the Drawing School in Brighton who are running life-drawing workshops working from an actor to create storyboards. Contacts:
Anne Noble-Partridge - www.londondrawing.com for The Drawing Theatre
Alice Mahtani - info@thedrawingschool.org.uk for Sara Easby workshop

We hope to make the London one at least!

Spring 2009

The Art of the Life-Model
Following our look at the Model as Performance Artist in the Autumn, we shift our focus to a more classical vein this Spring and investigate The Model as Patron with selected works from Leeds City Art Gallery's collection and its current touring exhibition 'Rank'. Sessions are free and on a 'drop-in' basis at Leeds City Art Gallery. They use drama, art history and life-drawing to reflect on themes relating to the role of the model in the making of figurative arts work. The Model as Patron is one aspect of the many histories of the life-model as uncovered by our work in this field, and relates to systems of patronage, portrait commission and 'sitting'in life-modellling history.

Saturday 14th February, 1-4pm
Pauline Buonaparte Borghese : 'Venus and the Bath of Milk'. A look at Antonio Canova's 'Hope Venus' and a reflection on his most famous 'Venus' model - Pauline Bonaparte Borgehese.

Saturday 14th March, 1-4pm
Dorothy Una Ratcliffe: ' Gypsylorism and the Capturing of Words'. A look at the model for Ivan Mestrovic's 'The Reader', and an investigation of Gypsylorism in early C20th Yorkshire.

Saturday 18th April, 10am-4pm
In Whose Image? A Dayschool on Patronage, Power and Class in Image-Making, taking inspiration from the 'Rank' exhibition and its featured works.

Contact us at 07800 861351 or at ninakane@btinternet.com for more info.

Following the success of last September's student exhibition at the Swarthmore Centre,Christine Hinchliffe is organising an open exhibition of works produced friom this term's Art of the Life-Model sessions and invites any participant to submit work for this. The exhibition will be held at Leeds Central Library Artspace in the month of September 2009. Contact Christine at cdhinchliffe@hotmail.com if you would like to participate.

Fine Art student and artist Matthew Pinder is covering these sessions amongst other activities in his blog. Visit this at: htpp:/automatton.wordpress.com

A big thank you to Leeds City Art Gallery Education, and its Supervisor / Gallery Floor staff for their support of these sessions.

Artistic Director Invited To Be RAM Rep!
The Register of Artists' Models (www.modelreg.co.uk)have invited Nina Kane to be their representative for the North East of England! The Register of Artists' Models camapigns tirelessly for better employment conditions for life-models and offers a fantastic agency service to models looking for work, and for life-drawing groups / tutors looking for models. RAM has a new Director - Rachel McCarthy - and we congratulate her on her new post! Cast-Off (and our sister organisation WILMA) have long supported RAM and its aims. Nina is proud to accept RAM's invitation and looks forward to representing its members and campaigns in the North East!

Crossing the Atlantic...and into the Heart of the Beast!
A long-time friend and collaborator is off to explore puppetry at acclaimed experimental company In the Heart of the Beast. We look forward to hearing all about it in the autumn! Check them out at www.hobt.org

Third-Year Degree Students work on 'Bride-Cake Bride-Bones'
Third-year drama students at Huddersfield University are currently developing Act 2 of 'Bride-Cake Bride-Bones' for their Final Year Directing Project. The script, written by Nina Kane, was developed from life-drawing performance days at Leeds Art Gallery in July 2008 (see below). The student cast have been brought together by exciting young director Eluned Murphy - an up-and-coming talent if ever there was one! - and we are very excited with what we see in rehearsals! Watch this space...!


Winter 2008
Support the Striking French Life-Models! Send a message of support to them by e-mailing your comments to ninakane@btinternet.com before Tuesday 13th January 2009!If you wish to add your name to our petition, please do so by e-mailing us your name and town.

On 15th December 2008, life-models from the College des Beaux Arts in Paris staged a nude protest supported by artists who drew them as they stood in freezing temperatures. The striking models were protesting over the French Government's ban on them accepting tips through the traditional 'cornet' - a cone of paper that is passed around after a life-drawing class for artists to place their tips in. The tips are essential in supporting the models' meagre earnings. Cast-Off Drama and WILMA recognise the seriousness of their position and whole-heartedly support their aims. We ask you to join with us in sending them a message of support from across the Channel. For further information visit The Guardian newspaper's website (see artice on 17th Dec '08), or search You Tube for images under 'French model's nude protest'. Thank you!

Wallpaper, Roses, Reposes...
We are investigating temporary art spaces in which to host our durational performance of Wallpaper. It is a play in three acts designed for an installation space, and the actors perform it in permanent cycles over the course of a day.

Between Stars
Plans are firming up for a site-specific production of our piece about the lives of Maria Callas and Dorothy Squires in the Autumn of 2009, followed by a Galleries production of Poisson D'Argent (funding-permitting) in the Spring of 2010. Between Stars was scripted with funding from the Leeds Philosophical & Literary Society. We are grateful to the society for their ongoing support. More details to follow...!

The Art of the Life-Model
The Autumn programme of wild performance art and modelling happenings at Leeds City Art Gallery was a resounding success! It was well-attended by regulars and brought a positive interest from members of the public passing through the Gallery. Working largely with improvised modelling and movement within the public spaces of the Gallery, it marked a departure from our usual practices, and brought a heady cocktail of foil, feathers, paper boxes, masks, nude clowning and the story of Cinderella to Saturday afternoon visitors! We envisage a slightly different format for it this Spring 2009, and will be announcing details towards the middle of January so watch this space...! Thank you to all those who attended and who continue to support the work through their presence and input.

We recommend...The Hounding of David Oluwale, 31st Jan - 21st Feb at West Yorkshire Playhouse
Check out the West Yorkshire Playhouse's production of 'The Hounding of David Oluwale', based on the award-winning book by Kester Aspden, and adapted by Oladipo Agboluaje for the stage. David Oluwale was a homeless Nigerian man with Mental Health difficulties who died in police custody after brutal hounding by Leeds officers in 1969. We are supporting the campaign to build a memorial to David Oluwale in the centre of Leeds. For details of this, contact Max Farrar, Community Engagement Officer at Leeds metropolitan University on : m.farrar@leedsmet.ac.uk

Autumn 2008

The Art of the Life-Model returns to Leeds Art Gallery in partnership with the company. We use drama, art history and life-drawing to explore the gallery's collection and touring exhibitions. The sessions are on a 'drop-in' basis and are free!
Saturday 13 September 1-4pm
Saturday 27 September 1- 4pm
Saturday 4, 18, 25 October 1- 4pm
Saturday 8, 15, 29 November 1- 4pm
Saturday 6 December 1- 4pm
Contact 07800 861351 for more info.

Exhibition at the Swarthmore Centre Leeds.
Art of the Life-Model students past and present have come together to organise a community exhibition of work inspired by sessions led by Nina Kane from 2002 - present. The initiative came directly from the students and Cast-Off Drama are very proud that the work of the course is being honoured in this way. The exhibited pieces are fantastic and a lot of hard work hasbeen put in to the organising. The exhibtion will run from 28th September - 18th October at the Swarthmore Centre cafe, Leeds. Opening 29th October, 7pm - all welcome.

Life-Drawing Workshops for 6th Formers at Temple Moor High School, Leeds
We are running a series of after-school workshops for 6th Formers in life-drawing in the Art department of Temple Moor through the Autumn Term. The sessions are model-led and cover a range of topics from analytical drawing to performance art, narrative figuration and the Body in Technology. The sessions are now up and running and very well-attended by a wonderfully creative and mature group of young people. We are very excited to be working with the school and say a big thanks to Claire Harris of the Art Department for initiating the programme.

Bride-Cake Bride-Bones
The script is now complete and has been developed as a play for technology. We are seeking funding to develop this further. Watch this space!

Bates Mill
We are now happily esconced at Bates Mill in Huddersfield and will shortly embark on an intensive 'making' process in the Artspace towards some sculptural pieces for Bride-Cake Bride-Bones.


Summer 2008 - new developments!:
On the Move again...!

Having enjoyed a year of administrative luxury at the Media Centre Huddersfield, Cast-Off Drama will be moving out of the F5 office on October 1st. We will still be leasing a 'Front Desk' service from the Media Centre, so for all postal enquiries, please continue to contact us there. Thank you to all the Media Centre staff for their friendliness in the last year.

We are very pleased to announce, however, that we have found a wonderful new 'making' space at Bates Mill in Huddersfield. It is a beautiful mill building on South Queen Street and we look forward to meeting lots of new people in the Artspace and embarking on some exciting collaborations with them. Artistic Director Nina Kane will be moving in to Studio 3, Floor 1 on September 26th.

The Art of the Life-Model returns...
Free-of-charge 'drop-in' workshops exploring the role of the life-model in the making of figurative art. These model-led workshops use drama, life-drawing, movement, art history and performance art to explore works in the gallery's collection, and touring exhibitions. Open to all - come as and when you can! Saturday afternoons, 1-4pm, Leeds City Art Gallery. Exact dates tbc.

We are very excited to announce that from Autumn 2008, The Art of the Life-Model will be run exclusively by Cast-Off Drama as part of our education programme. The Art of the Life-Model has brought over 900 participants into Leeds City Art Gallery since its inception in 2002. Originating from Cast-Off Drama and WILMA's 'Will You, Won't You' pilot project in July 2002, the course run through the Leeds College of Art & Design's Community Education department, until withdrawal of funding this Summer. We are grateful to the college's community education department for its support of the course over the years and wish them well in their new ventures. Due to massive support from its participants and requests for the course not to fold, Cast-Off Drama will continue to run this innovative and much-loved workshop programme and are seeking funding to develop it further in the future. The course has a strong track record in offering practical, experimental opportunities and access to creative, model-centred working within the Leeds community, and is open to anyone whatever their background, ability or level of experience. We are very grateful to Leeds City Art Gallery for their continued support, and look forward to announcing exact dates in due course - so watch this space!


Between Stars back on...
Negotiations are back on with Spacemaker Storage in Leeds to provide a performance venue for our installation-based production on the lives of Maria Callas and Dorothy Squires. Updates soon...!

Anyone for Doubles?
Nina will be collaborating with Michael Cleary to run a series of doubles workshops on alternate Sundays in Leeds. The sessions will run from 10am-4pm and will explore working from two models. The morning session will feature Michael and a visiting model (male or female), the afternoon session will feature Nina and Michael working to a particular 'doubles' theme. The sessions are 'drop-in' and will cost £6 for the day! A bargain! Venue details are being confirmed as we speak so watch this space!

The Body Religious - Nina and Michael are in negotiation with the Flesh Festival due to happen in Bradford this October. We hope to offer a day-long life-modelling performance investigating genedered images of the male and female body in religious art. The performance will be open for visitors to come and draw or watch. Fingers crossed this happens - updates soon!


'Bride-Cake Bride-Bones'

Friday 11th July 10am - 4pm
Saturday 12th July 10am-4pm
Sunday 13th July 1-4pm
Education Workshop

Three days of life-modelling performance at Leeds City Art Gallery on the figure of Miss Havisham in 'Great Expectations'(Dickens)and in response to
Helen Chadwick's 'Eat Me' currently exhibited in the Gallery's collection. The performance is open on a 'drop-in' basis to life-drawers, writers, performance artists, musicians, theatre-makers and anyone interested in attending.
Free of charge, materials provided but feel free to bring your own too.
'Bride-Cake Bride-Bones' forms part of ongoing research into the potential of
life-modelling theatre to create new writing and develops from 'Minotaur' as an invesitgation into female desire and rage. Contact us at 07800 861351 / 01484 685948 for more details.

Spring 2008:

'Minotaur'

You are invited to come and do some life-drawing and / or writing at Leeds
City Art Gallery Education Workshop this Friday 7th March, 10am-4pm. The
event is a 'drop-in', free of charge, all materials provided.

'Minotaur' is an experimental life-modelling piece performed by Nina Kane of
Cast-Off Drama to 'Stengam' by Cor Fuhler. The work explores writing and
storytelling through the body using mask, physical theatre and sustained,
nude, posing. It offers fantastic opportunity for making drawings,
paintings, 3-D work and creative writing. We will be working with both
electric light and candlelight. Come as and when you can, stay for half an
hour or all day! All welcome. Please bring a thread with you!

'Minotaur' forms part of ongoing work for a module on Collaborative Writing
that Nina is completing as part of an MA in Writing for Performance at
University of Huddersfield.For any questions on the event please contact
castoffdrama@btinternet.com or ring 07800 861351 / 01484 685948.

Striped Dress

We are currently developing a script about the model-artist relationship between Kathleen Newton and James Jacques Jospeh Tissot. The working title is: 'Striped Dress'. Watch this space for updates.

Work on the other scripts is going well. See our repetoire section for details.

Kimbal Bumstead

Check out Kimbal Bumstead's work with life-modelling at: www.kimbalbumstead.com and www.tapedduck.com . Kimbal did a wonderful performance at arts@trinity exploring touch and the life-model as object. (His website will explain this better so have a look!) It is great to see other artists working performatively with this field and we expect more performances to come from him and other model-performers in the Leeds area in the not-too-distant future! Well worth a visit!

The Art Studio, Sunderland

Also check out The Art Studio, Sunderland - a wonderful community resource for artists living with mental health issues. Drop-in and see them if you are in the area! It's an absolutely inspiring place with some brilliant work going on - www.theartstudio.org

Parita

New developments!! We are delighted to be teaming up with Parita - a company delivering training to local government departments and small CVS organisations on Equalities issues. We will be using our theatre of the body, also Forum Theatre and other political theatre methods to explore good working practice and provide education and consciousness-raising activities on a range of Equalities issues.

Embodying the Other

Embodying the Other: Pedagogic and Performative Strategies Used in the Art of the Life-Model 2002 - 2007 by Nina Kane is now available as a reference document at Leeds College of Art & Design Libraries and Leeds City Art Gallery Education Dept.

Cast-Off's Artistic Director Nina Kane will be presenting the current findings of her research into contemporary life-modelling studies at The Leeds College of Art & Design, Wednesday 30th January. More details to follow.

News from elsewhere:

WILMA -Having successfully completed an exciting autumn programme, we are writing up our interim report for The Scarman Trust and look forward to receiving our second installment of funds to run more workshops this Spring. We also hope to establish the WILMA facebook and get models contributing! Thanks to a successful male model launch on Nov 16th at The Media Centre (formerly Host) in Leeds, MILMA (Men Into Life-Modelling Arts) is now up and running. Contact Paul Armitage via the WILMA e-mail for further details.

The Art of the Life-Model - Was in danger of being replaced by a straight life-drawing class last term but was reinstated after students protested and said they wanted it kept just as it was! Hurray! We promise to run even more exciting, experimental, model-led and community-centred workshops this term in our 10-week 'Drama-into-Drawing' module! And yes, we have stolen this phrase from Cast-Off Drama but isn't it a good one?! Sessions are back to being held at weekends, and will run from Saturday 12th January - Saturday 15th March 2008 inclusive (no half-term), 1-4pm, Education Room, Leeds City Art Gallery.

Students on The Art of the Life-Model are planning an exhibition showing works made in response to the course's workshop sessions and life-modelling experiments over the years. If you would like to be involved in organising this please contact Christine Smith (details to follow).

Frozen Blog....Sleeping Beauty Awakes!
We experienced some technical difficulties with the blog and as a result many of our entries between 2006 - 2007 were frozen and were unable to be accessed. Thankfully this is now rectified and we publish below a synthesis of those postings.

Autumn 2007:

From October 2007, Cast-Off Drama is renting an office in The Media Centre, Huddersfield. Our address for correspondance until the Summer of 2008 will be:
Cast-Off Drama, Unit F5, The Media Centre, 7 Northumberland Street, Huddersfield, HD1 1RL. Fax: 0870 990 5100.

Modelworks...a programme of model-led life-drawing workshops will run from Nov 8th - Dec 13th, every Thursday, 9.30 - 3.30pm, in the Circle / Corner rooms at The Media Centre, Huddersfield. Cost: £12 / £8 concessions. We are sorry these are not free, but haven't you noticed there's an Olympics on?! All money goes directly to pay the model.

Work is going well on the scripts, but an opportunity to participate in the University of Leeds Jack Keroauc 50th Anniversary 'On the Road' conference is lost as the conference is cancelled due to a fire in the planning office! Our commiserations to the Conference organisers.

Artistic Director Nina Kane has completed a paper for the Leeds College of Art & Design on her performance research into contemporary life-modelling studies - Embodying the Other: Performative and Pedagogic Strategies Used in The Art of the Life-Model, 2002 - 2007 ((C) Nina Kane, 2007). The paper references the work of Cast-Off Drama in contributing to teaching and studies in this field. The research will be presented to the public in January 2008.

News from our friends..

WILMA - Thanks to the Community Champions Award from Cando, The Scarman Trust we are proud to launch a programme of free workshops for female models in community venues across Leeds, Huddersfield and Barnsley. We will also be launching a start-up workshop for male models on Nov 16th. Creche provided at some venues. Visit www.wilmawomenlifemodels.blogspot.com for further info.

The Art of the Life-Model returns to Leeds City Art Gallery (Education Workshop) this term with a 10-week module 'Performance Art & the Model'. Sessions are on Tuesday evenings from 5-8pm. Contact Neil Hedges at Leeds College of Art & Design
(0113 202 8165) for enrolment details.

Spring / Summer 2007:

Cast-Off Drama is in negotiation with Spacemaker Storage, Leeds to provide an installation venue for 'Between Stars. We have met with Hayden Productions with the prospect of some exciting video collaboration on the piece. Looks promising! Watch this space for further details.

Artistic Director Nina Kane visits Helensburgh, Glasgow and Edinburgh searching out locations and site-specific inspiration for 'Poisson d'Argent'. Useful research done for play script. Further research visits planned.

We have received a grant from the Leeds Philosophical & Literary Society towards the costs of writing 'Between Stars'. The work focuses on the lives of Maria Callas and Dorothy Squires. Thank you very much to the society for their assistance.

We begin work on 'Pull My Daisy'- a work for male models based on writing by Leonard Cohen, Jack Keroauc and Neal Cassidy.

Our administration folder of draft funding applications and research ideas is lost on a train between Leeds and Newcastle. Most of it handwritten. It is never seen again! Is this a sign? We desperately need an office!

News from Elsewhere:

Community Champions!!!! WILMA has received a Community Champions Award for £2,000 to run a series of free life-modelling workshops for women interested in trying life-modelling or currently working as life-models. A big thank you to John Parkes at Roundhay Rd Resource Centre, Leeds and The Scarman Trust for their advice on this!
The news is dampened by the report that we are likely to be one of the last groups to receive this as the Government has withdrawn the Small Grants programme and will be closing the Community Champions scheme from February 2008. It will not replaced with anything else. We urge everyone who cares about grassroots, voluntary,small-scale community projects to write to their MP c/o the House of Commons to oppose this.

The Art of the Life-Model: has moved from a 'drop-in' to a 10-week modular system. It is still being run at Leeds College of Art & Design as we await the refurbishment at Leeds City Art Gallery. It is now running on Thursdays, 6-9pm at Jacob Kramer buildings, Blenheim Walk. Contact Neil Hedges on 0113 202 8000 for more details.

Ocarina Nina: The Singing Secretary and Fiona Folk are very excited to be appearing at the Sunrise Festival in Glastonbury this June. We intend to focus on the larger festivals in forthcoming years and move further afield to other areas of Europe.

Summer / Autumn 2006:

Cast-Off Drama has developed and incorporated two organisations under its wing in recent years - WILMA: Women Into Life-Modelling Arts and Ocarina Nina Street-Theatre. For a whole range of logisitical (and very positive) reasons, we have decided that these should operate separately and in the Summer of 2006, we took the decision that Ocarina Nina and WILMA should act as separate entities from Cast-Off Drama and continue to flourish and prosper in their own spheres. We wish them well on their journeys and will update Cast-Off blogwatchers on their progress.

News!
Cast-Off Drama, WILMA and Ocarina Nina Street-Theatre & Singing go their different ways. This is a decision taken as a mark of success - we have all outgrown each others' remits and are strong enough to fly off in our different directions. Visit Ocarina Nina's blog at: ocarinanina@blogspot.com


Work begins on the script of 'Poisson d'Argent' - a Gallery work for life-models on the 1857 Madeleine Smith story.

News from elsewhere:

The Art of the Life-Model is temporarily at Bracken Edge Primary School / Space@ art room, Chapeltown, Leeds. Monday evenings, 6-9pm while Leeds City Art Gallery has its long-awaited makeover! The artspace at Bracken Edge is fantastic! We also have a new Community Education manager Marianne Springham - welcome to her and a big thanks to Garry Barker for his support over the years! We look forward to new innovations!


Latest News... Spring 2006

Moving Bodies – A Cast-Off Drama workshop, Leeds City Art Gallery

Friday 2nd June, 10am-4pm - Free workshop. Part of the Frank Brangwyn exhibition programme (6th April - 18th June 2006).
Moving Bodies explores the journeying aspects of Frank Brangwyn’s work through drama, storytelling, figure-drawing, mask-making, textiles and discussion. We focus on his images of itinerant workers, notably his depictions of sailors, spinners and Travellers, and investigate the development of the vardo as an art influence on Brangwyn’s frames and motifs. The workshop offers an opportunity to experiment with a range of art materials and drama practices in relation to the exhibition. The workshop is free, all materials provided.
Moving Bodies is put on in connection with Cast-Off Drama’s forthcoming production ‘Beads’ (23rd/25th June).
Research funded by Leeds Philosophical & Literary Society
For booking contact Nina Kane, 01484 685 948
E-mail: castoffdrama@btinternet.com

Beads ('I took the beads of her necklace...') 23rd - 25th June - POSTPONED due to underfunding and cast injury. Despite a strong community input for resources, funds to rehearse with a cast were unforthcoming, and cast injury has prevented us from doing it voluntarily - as such we took the difficult decision to postpone this event. We are continuing to make the work and will relaunch the project when circumstances improve. Meanwhile, we would like to say a big thank you to Inner North West Area Committee Neighbourhood & Housing (Leeds City Council) for the offer of creche funding, Councillor Penny Ewens for MICE money, Swarthmore Centre, Leeds College of Art & Design and Leeds City Art Gallery for resources, venue and materials support, Bracken Edge Primary School for studio space and Women Into Community Health Network, Wade's Charity and Leeds Philosophical & Literary Society for research funds.

'Beads', A two and a half day continuous production for artists, sculptors and makers - Friday 23rd June 10am- 4pm and 6 - 8.30pm; Saturday 24th June 10am - 4pm, and Sunday 25th June 10am - 12pm; Swarthmore Education Centre, Main Hall - 'drop-in' performance. Free creche. Cast-Off offers audiences a unique opportunity to experience a story told in two ways. On the Friday evening come and watch a play. On the Saturday the story will be retold through tableaux images - drop-in, make drawings and paintings - bring loose beads with you to tell your own tales.

Beads is a horror story of greed, wounding and obsession. It tells the story of Ella and the vampiric Mrs de Plein. Ella collects beads. She finds, cleans and polishes them, listens to their stories and threads them into necklaces to sell. Mrs de Plein is a grande dame with large purse and a huge magnifying glass. She loves to get her teeth into something. An amateur anthropologist, explorer and bead enthusiast, she is determined to acquire 'all things Ella' at any cost. As her obsession grows, the audience is sucked into a chilling tale of evasion and pursuit which moves through Elzabethan England, the C19th and the Holocaust. Part clown show / part pantomime, grotesque and compelling, Beads is an enticing and challenging piece of physical theatre.

Two and a half years in the making, 'Beads' tackles the issue of C19th 'Gypsylorism' head-on through a physical theatre investigation of image, text, film and music. Eschewing the vampiric and reductive images of the past, we build new stories, tableaux and soundscapes inspired by the work of contemporary Traveller artists - Cor Fuhler, Hester Hedges, Tony Gatlif, Bob Lovell, Papusza - as well as non-Traveller sources.

'Beads' is Cast-Off's first major all-cast production since 'Chime Chimera' (2003) (though as many of you know, there has been some solo performances and workshops since). We are proud to be returning to the Swarthmore Centre, a fully-accessible community venue, and one of our initial supporters.

Also....Cast-Off recommends that you check out 'Second Site' - an exhibition of four Traveller Artists to be held at the West Park Centre, Leeds 5th - 28th May. For full details contact Dianne Greenhow at Travellers Education Service on 0113 274 8050 or Peter Saunders - Peter.saunders@educationleeds.co.uk . Artists exhibiting are: Daniel Baker, Ferdinand Koci, Damian LeBas, Delaine LeBas. Also, for those of you working in schools, the Traveller Education Service is running a Traveller Storytelling project. Contact Dianne or Peter for further information.

The Singing Secretary will be launching her 3rd Summer Season at Holmfirth Folk Festival on Saturday 6th May. She will be appearing at Garforth Arts Festival in Leeds on Saturday 8th July, and at Banstead Community Festival, Leeds on Saturday 22nd July. More dates to follow. For details of the Banstaed Park Festival, contact Peter Turner on 0113 240 6486, and check out Pete's website at www.peanut-the-clown.com

Cast-Off recommends...that you check out The Naked Shed. - www.thenakedshed.blogspot.com Naked Shed has developed from work at Dartington College Devon with Jerry Holloway and Emma Leeming and explores life-modelling in sheds at three sites in Devon and at the Roundhouse, Hebden Bridge on 18th June. In 2004 Cast-Off collaborated with Jerry in a Leeds-Devon Exchange. Hosted by WILMA / Cast-Off in Leeds, and the 'Out of Context' Symposium at Dartington, Nina and Jerry explored life-modelling theatre, clowning, gender and movement with life-drawers from Devon and Leeds. The work was inspirational to all involved and we are excited by developments at Dartington since this time. Emma is an experienced life-model and artist and has recently curated a project about sheds. Following the Roundhouse event she will exhibit the finished life-drawings in a local park. Well worth checking out!

We have moved!! Cast-Off Drama is now located in the beautiful Netherthong area of Holmfirth. We are very excited about this move and the potential it offers to broaden our work. We will still keep our links with Leeds, but look forward to working with artists and performers in the wider region. Our new contact details are as follows:
Cast-Off Drama, 133 Leas Avenue, Holmfirth, HD9 3EW. Tel: 01484 685948. E-mail: castoffdrama@btinternet.com

Studio space... We are grateful to Bracken Edge Primary School, Leeds and the Head Chris Walton for once again providing us with much-needed studio space at the school. We will be resident until the June break making a selection of masks for children's theatre. We are still engaged in making Serafina's Yard in the space (see below under 'recent projects') and are happy to report the Jinny's Car Scrap box is being filled with a wonderful array of old toy cars, trains and diggers! Work on the scrap yard will begin after Easter.

'Off the Wall!' An exhibition of Cast-Off Drama's work is now on the walls of the cafe exhibition space at Swarthmore Education Centre, Leeds and very fabulous it looks too! The work has prompted lively conversation and admiration - it will run from from 8th January - 4th February 2006. The exhibition is primarily of work from the two Venus Interventions projects, but also includes masks and photos from other projects and work-in-progress from 'Serafina's Yard' and 'There are no pockets in shrouds (Le Grand Depart)'. Thank you to Swarthmore for their help in getting this up.

'Raaz Ki Baat II' Cast-Off are delighted to be returning to Nasha to work on their young peoples' project. Nasha have teamed up Project 7, a youth project in the Chapeltown area of Leeds for the production. We will be working with youths from both projects on 'Raaz ki Baat' a production about drugs-taking in the South Asian community. Raaz Ki Baat was devised by youths on the Nasha project with Cast-Off and premiered at the Pakistani Centre, Leeds in May 2005. It is performed in a mixture of Urdu, Mirpury and English. The next production will be performed in the Space@ facility in Hillcrest Primary School, Chapeltown, Leeds on Friday 7th April, 6pm.

A New Wardrobe! Cast-Off Drama has 'inherited' the costume collection from the former Ascot School of Ballet. As such we have a magnificent children's wardrobe of frocks, hats and props for our youth work. We are immensly grateful to the family of Pat Hall (formerly Ascot) - Lydia, Mark and Tina- for passing these onto us. Given the sheer volume of dance wear, we have been sharing our good fortune and have passed sets of beautiful costumes and leotards on to Tanya Cusan's Salsa Theatre school for their Children's Salsa Productions. For details of Children's Salsa workshops please contact Tanya Cusan at www.tanyacusanespinosa.co.uk Thank you very much again to Tina, Mark & Lydia.

Staff Challenge Day: Cast-Off successfully ran a 'challenge' day workshop for employees of Thompson Design in Leeds on 21st January 2006. The staff attending the day were 100% committed to the activities and gave freely of energy, creativity and enthusiasm! The workshop was well-received and we look forward to future dealings with the company.
The Art of the Life-Model 'drop-in' sessions held at Leeds City Art Gallery will start again on 7th May, 1-4pm. (see below for details of this). This term's dates are:

Sunday 7th May 1-4pm
Sunday 14th May 1-4pm
Sunday 21st May 1-4pm
Sunday 28th May 1-4pm
Sunday 4th June 1-4pm
Half-term
Thursday 15th June 10am-1pm
Thursday 29th June 10am-1pm
Thursday 6th July 10am-1pm
Thursday 13th July 10am - 1pm
Thursday 20th July 10am-1pm

(Joint partnership between Leeds College of Art & Design and Leeds City Art Gallery. Sessions devised and run by Nina Kane - Tel: 0113 202 8166 / 247 8254. Please note that due to refurbishment work at Leeds City Art Gallery from Autumn 2006, the course is likely to be run through a community venue for the next academic year, offering us a fantastic opportunity to develop the experimental aspects of the life-modelling and life-drawing work. We look forward to returning to the Gallery after its re-opening in Summer 2007.)

About Ocarina NIna and WILMA (Spring 2006):

Street-Theatre... Under the auspices of Ocarina Nina Street-Theatre, Cast-Off offers festival goers a fantastic set of walkabout characters. Acapella singing is a central specialism of our street-theatre performance with all charcters using a wide repertoire of songs. Our main figure is The Singing Secretary - a poshPA with golden phone who invites you to 'choose a button from the box' before singing a song - jazz, blues, folk, pop, opera, showbiz musicals...the range is eclectic and varied. For Christmas events we have Christmas Carol - a singing lady Santa who gives you a 'bauble and a warble' with a repertoire of tunes from Bing to Bethlehem! For promotional events (leafleting flyers and brochures etc) we have Shopping Molly who peeks at your purchases whilst promoting the event...ring her till and she'll give you a trill of whatever Supermarket music happens to be in her Chanel-adorned head!

New from late Summer 2006 and ideal for Folk and Blues Festivals is Fiona Folk - a bustle-wearing, basket-carrying Belle of the Woods who will offer you a sprig of lavender whilst crooning a folky tune. Ballads, bells and smells Fiona Folk croons an impressive repertoire from Dylan to Dairymaids! Ideal for folk, country, blues and world-music audiences.

On a more lyrical note, Milady Milarkey is an original Shakespearian clown reciting songs and odes from the works of the Bard. Available for all arts festivals, also for figurative drawing sessions.

Incorporating...
Cast-Off incorporates 'Ocarina Nina Street-Theatre' and 'WILMA - Women Into Life-Modelling Arts' and works with local communities and small organisations to explore 'the theatre of the body' in meaningful, people-centred projects.