Capel: The Lights are On: A Conversation...Margaret Ames and Mike Pearson

This article offers a transcript of conversations between the authors that formed part of the methodology of a practice led enquiry which was part of the AHRC funded project 'Challenging Concepts of Liquid Place through Performing Practices in Community Contexts' The project's PI Sally Mackey at RCSSD brought in 3 practice based collaborators and here CI's Ames and Pearson articulate elements of one of those practices by Cyrff Ystwyth, a dance-theatre company led by Ames whose members include people with learning disabilities. Cyrff Ystwyth worked once a week for 9 months to produce a performance created by one member with learning disabilities as his response to the themes of the overall research enquiry. Ames and Pearson met each week, the day after the rehearsal to think about what the process and eventually, the final event, produced in terms of the research questions and in terms of the practice as medium and method for new understandings of theatre and learning disability. Both the nature of the group and the cultural context are considered in relation to the overall research project that concerns issues of emplacement, dislocation and vulnerability and finds that the form of the practice, dance-theatre, and its aesthetics might articulate responses to these issues rather than a verbal interrogation concerning meaning and intention.