Arts Access AotearoaA collaborative project between The White Room Creative Space and Tiny Fest in Ōtautahi Christchurch will be showcased at Tiny Fest’s three-day performance festival starting on Friday 22 November.
The White Room received the Whakahoa Whakawatea Kaitoi Tangata Holdsworth Creative Spaces Fellowship 2023 to develop a project called Tiny Rooms, in partnership with Tiny Fest.
The completed project, resulting in a six-minute film called Label Factory, is dedicated to The White Room’s community of disabled artists. It includes performances by White Room actors Merna Fam, Isaac Tait, Ben Morris and Matthew Swaffield. Also in the video are Simon Gray and Blaire Rose-Forrester, White Room co-lead with Simon.
The film will run throughout Tiny Fest 2024. At the same time, White Room actors will ask audiences to contribute their own labels in response to the film. Simon Gray, Art Co-ordinator of The White Room, says this will build a library of labels that will form a final record of the Fellowship project.
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“Throughout the Fellowship, we explored ideas, changed direction, discussed the creative process and came up with a performance piece that included elements and input from everyone involved,” Simon says.
“As well as the workshops, each artist also had a one-on-one session with Tiny Fest’s artistic director, Janaína Moraes, to support their art practice and discuss future opportunities.
“We all learned a lot of valuable skills like how to storyboard ideas; work collaboratively and co-create ideas; and try out new ideas.”
“Everyone participated well”
Ben Morris enjoyed being part of the group and says that “everyone participated well”.
Fellow actor Isaac Tait says he liked the whole project and was proud that his artwork was used in the film. “I would do it all over again.”
The White Room focuses on visual arts while Tiny Fest’s focus is on performing arts.
“It’s been a fascinating journey of performance arts and we stepped outside our comfort zone, especially when we came to perform the piece,” Simon says.
“The collaboration side of the project has been really interesting for us, working as a group rather than as an individual.”
The partners describe the project as a “reciprocal incubator” where they explored and learned new ways of making art together. Through conversation, experimentation and artmaking, they took part in a series of activations and workshops from February through to July 2024.
Focusing ideas and refining plans
Focusing ideas and refining plans“We ran a number of workshops at Tūranga, the central library,” Simon says. “This helped focus our ideas as we began to refine our plans for what we wanted to produce.
“A theme began to emerge around the idea of labelling, clearly connected to being in a library but one that also resonated with the actors’ own experiences. This idea was further explored and formed the basis of the final performance.”
The film was shown at the launch event for Tiny Fest 2024 and Simon says everyone agreed they wanted to continue developing work together.
“Longer-term benefits will include opportunities for the artists to participate in new projects, contribute to discussions around accessibility, and connect with other artists and organisations.
“The Fellowship has opened doors into different arts and opportunities for The White Room, both for the artists and facilitators. Working in new artforms helps us to create and think differently, and in turn contributes to a thriving and flourishing community.’
