Sustaining Practice

2023 SUSTAINING PRACTICE RESIDENCY

 

ReadyMade Works is very pleased to announce that the recipient of the 2023 Sustaining Practice residency is Lizzie Thomson. Lizzie will be working at ReadyMade across July and August. We are so looking forward to having her in the studio.

"Through this residency, I propose to thoroughly reawaken my semi dormant dance-improvisation practice. I want to use this return to dancing as an opportunity to re-engage with dance differently, with a new and greater permission. Gone are the days of a young, injury-free, fit, muscly body. I want to focus now on a deep exploration of a dancing bodily condition of radical, empathic subjectivity. This experimentation into embodied subjectivity smiles back at the 1960s feminist statement ‘the personal is political’. I am interested in delving far into what it means to develop idiosyncratic, personal movement and how to dwell inside the intimate relations between the person and the dance."

The Sustaining Practice Residency is supported by the City of Sydney.

Image: Matthew Miceli Photography

The aim of the Sustaining Practice Residency is to support NSW-based dance artists to deepen their creative practice and develop their work in a funded capacity. Artists can apply to develop a creative project or explore their creative practice. The residency is open to professional mid-career and established NSW-based artists working with dance, choreography and movement-based practices. 

Support:
• An artist fee of $3600
• 120 hours of studio space at ReadyMade Works  
• A collaborator, or production budget, of $1000 

• A facilitated open showing at the conclusion of the residency


Timing: 

• June - August
• 120 hours can be undertaken consecutively, or spread out throughout June - August 2023

Who can apply: 

• Artists with a professional practice whom identify as mid-career* or established artists.
• Individuals or groups of artists 

• Artists who are NSW-based* however interstate artists can be involved as collaborators. 

• Collaborators can be from any discipline and can include outside eyes, or 
mentors. 


*Mid-career indicates an artist who has accumulated experience presenting their creative work in a professional context and who has been developing their practice as an artist for at least ten years. This experience should be reflected in the biography provided.

*NSW-based indicates an artist who considers NSW to be the primary base for their creative practice and residence. This should be the case for the duration of the residency and reflected in the artist biography provided
 

The Sustaining Practice Residency is supported by the NSW Government through Create NSW.

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2022 Sustaining Practice Resident

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Rakini Devi 

 

We are excited to announce that Rakini Devi will be undertaking our Sustaining Practice Residency for 2022 and will be in the studio across July/August. 

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By employing the body as the receptacle of memory, and her love of satire, choreographer and performance artist Rakini Devi will explore her concept of a long-brewing work titled I Used To Be A Dancer, experimenting with text, choreography and film, integrating her own visual art practice of drawing and painting. Known for her satirical parodies on contemporary western dance, New Age fads, and other themes, Rakini will target several aspects of her past and current practice, including the ageing dancing body, stereotypes, transitions and transgressions. 

The title is a satirical response to many who ask if she “still” performs. Her performance language is an ongoing work in progress, an unbroken journey of three decades of practice- led research of hybrid and intercultural performance and visual art.

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Rakini’s 2019 Critical Path residency titled " The body as archive" included a collaborative process with Karl Ockelford (Melb) who will continue to contribute video and sound design to this sustaining practice residency, expanding on their 19-year collaboration.

 

Sharing - Saturday 27th August at 6pm a

Where: The Rex Cramphorn Studio, University of Sydney

 

Rakini's sharing was held at The Rex Cramphorn studio in order to support her tech requirements in sharing this work. The residency was undertaken in the studio at ReadyMade Works.

Image: Rakini Devi: Inhabiting Erasures by Heidrun Lohr

 

2021 Sustaining Practice Resident 

Lee Serle
 
Lee is a Sydney based choreographer and performer. He graduated from the Victorian College of the Arts with a Bachelor of Dance in 2003. His work has been presented in France, USA, Colombia, Lebanon and Australia, and he has been commissioned to create new works for the Lyon Opera Ballet, Sydney Dance Company, Lucy Guerin Inc, Australian Centre for Contemporary Art (ACCA), Dancenorth, Victorian College of the Arts, and Colombian visual artist Mateo López. Lee has performed in the works of many notable choreographers including; Trisha Brown, Lucy Guerin, Tere O’Connor, Gideon Obarzanek, Shelley Lasica, among many others, and has received Fellowships from Rolex Arts Institute, Australia Council for the Arts (Creative Australia Fellowship) and City of Sydney.
 
Lee will use the Sustaining Practice residency to continue his solo choreography and improvisation practice, specifically focusing on the concept of originality: 
 
"Considering my career dancing for others, some for over a decade, choreographies and movement practices are embedded in my body and are difficult to undo. I am the product of my choreographic ‘parents’ and I have learned to dance a certain way, to value certain structures and aesthetics over others, yet over time I’ve consciously worked to create my own value systems, to incorporate certain aspects and reject others. From here I will tangle these choreographies and movement practices, rendering a third person that is not them, but not entirely me" 
 
Lee collaborated with sound artist Gail Priest, and will shared his work during the residency through improvisation workshops and open showings.



2020 Sustaining Practice Resident

Martin del Amo

Martin del Amo is a Sydney-based choreographer and dancer. He started out as a solo artist, acclaimed for his full-length solos fusing idiosyncratic movement and intimate storytelling. In recent years, Martin has also built a strong reputation as creator of group works and solos for others. His work has toured nationally in Australia and internationally to the UK, Japan and Brazil. Martin’s contributions to the Australian dance sector have been recognised with the 2018 Australian Dance Award for Outstanding Achievement in Independent Dance and a 2015 Sidney Myer Creative Fellowship. 
 
Martin intends to use the Sustaining Practice Residency to re-establish his solo practice by reconnecting with the methodological strategies he has developed over the last 20 years, both as solo artist and choreographer of works for other dancers. The focus will be on the interplay between movement, stillness, text and silence; the fragmentation and reconfiguration of separately choreographed body zones; and the contrasting of slowed down movement with accelerating spoken text. 
Martin will be collaborating with dance artists Sara Black (practice partner) and Julie-Anne Long (outside eye). 


ReadyMade Works will be worked with Martin to support his solo practice from May-July in accordance with restrictions relating to Covid-19.
 

The Sustaining Practice Residency is supported by the NSW Government through Create NSW.