DIY: 2016 – Katherine Araniello & Laura Dee Milnes ‘Playing The Victim’

THE DEADLINE FOR THIS DIY HAS NOW PASSED

Wallowing in the pathetic

Project summary

An opportunity to Play the Victim and indulge in your own weaknesses, led by two artists who revel in being overlooked and pitied for artistic profit. Through a series of exercises and performance activities, participants will spend two days exploring and exploiting their vulnerabilities, enacting the most wretched aspects of themselves, culminating in action-based performances in public spaces and a series of mentored film collaborations. Pondering on and wallowing in the 'pathetic', participants will be encouraged to become underdogs from the moment they introduce themselves, and are invited to play up, act out and under achieve as they find new ways to represent their low-status in order to reclaim it and use it to their own ends.

This workshop is an opportunity for artists to discover their inner victim, and embrace the poor thing.

Participants

The workshop is for 6 ‘normal’ participants who are able to demonstrate their victimhood in a suitably pathetic way. Applicants must be willing to perform in public, be documented and exploit their vulnerabilities for art’s sake. The venue for the workshop is fully wheelchair accessible. If you have any other accessibility requirements, please inform us in your application so that we can accommodate.

Applicants are required to answer the following questions:

• How far are you willing to go to get on this workshop? i.e. What will you stoop to?
• Explain how well (or unwell) you will be prepared for potential public humiliation?
• Why do you want to put yourself through this?
• Do you lift the loo seat up when you pee?
• Give an example of when you have exploited your status as a victim for your own personal gain.
• Please also provide a link to your website or work you have done recently
• Please provide a brief biog about your artistic practice

Dates, times and location

Dates: 31 August – 1 September 2016
Times: 12-6pm, both days
Location: Greenwich/Deptford (venue details sent to participants once places confirmed)
This DIY is supported by Artsadmin

The artists

Katherine Araniello uses subversive humour in response to the mundane and social awkwardness, constantly challenging notions of ability, using improvisation, interaction and technology to create unpredictable scenarios. Araniello also works under the guise of SickBitchCrips (SBC), a persona who is sharp, untamed, twisted and unpredictable.

Laura Dee Milnes works with performance, video, costume, object and text as well as curating, teaching and facilitating performance. She has a growing roster of personas, all of whom reflect aspects of herself taken to extremes, constructed from collected information, methods and imagery. Her work addresses her identity as female, poor and working class.