Thursday, June 15, 2006
Lab Fever
On 30st May Sarah, Eve and I took a trip up north with some Home of the Wriggler kit. Early on 31st I pushed on alone to York and Creative Encounters a seminar at the National Science Learning Centre. I’d been invited to do a small performance presentation about Performance and Science so I showed them a bit of Pedal Power lighting, explained the optics in It’s Your Film, bigged up The Black Maze, speculated about whether or not there was any science in the Fruit and Veg City or School Rulers kids projects. Finally I hit them with an introduction to Of All The People In All The World.
The real joy was sharing the bill with Professor John Holman the dapper and precise director of the centre. He gave a series of five show stopping demonstrations, with melting ice, burning methane, wriggling organisms, vaporising liquid nitrogen and bobbing coke cans. I was hooked. I want to go back to school and get back in the physics lab. I want to spend more time with the open and animated teachers and scientists and artists who were gathered at the seminar. I call to mind the film Rushmore and want to collaborate with Professor Holman on a school play.
Coming back to earth; in the afternoon, watching participants play with science toys, I had idea for a very simple piece of Performance Art Physics which a fortnight later still seems like a great one. I need to get on the phone to our friends at Forestdale school and see if I can book Birmingham Rep’s main stage for an afternoon.
James
The real joy was sharing the bill with Professor John Holman the dapper and precise director of the centre. He gave a series of five show stopping demonstrations, with melting ice, burning methane, wriggling organisms, vaporising liquid nitrogen and bobbing coke cans. I was hooked. I want to go back to school and get back in the physics lab. I want to spend more time with the open and animated teachers and scientists and artists who were gathered at the seminar. I call to mind the film Rushmore and want to collaborate with Professor Holman on a school play.
Coming back to earth; in the afternoon, watching participants play with science toys, I had idea for a very simple piece of Performance Art Physics which a fortnight later still seems like a great one. I need to get on the phone to our friends at Forestdale school and see if I can book Birmingham Rep’s main stage for an afternoon.
James
