Michelle St Anne’s practice interrogates collaboration and devising to re-write bodily and societal scripts. Her work exists at the intersection of social justice and artistic practice, drawing on the rich traditions in western and south Asian cannons to reveal the underlying experiences and dynamics of power, gender, space/site and expression.
Her company Living Room Theatre’s work is driven by proximity, that shatters the façade and blurs the line between viewer and performer.
In her research Michelle St Anne will explore questions about the philosophies of her practice and what new possibilities can be discovered when you bleed these digital and online platforms through choreographic approaches.
Through the provocation of proximity, and lens as metaphor and reality Michelle will explore:
What are the possibilities of the three viewing “bodies”? How does a choreographic approach merge the worlds? What new visual timbres and rhythms emerge?
How do these discoveries challenge experience.
To question the filming of live performance and how live and online worlds can co-exist each with their unique environments using choreographically approaches. The dance between the worlds.
Michelle is working with collaborator Manu Anand (India) and Imogen Cranna, supported by digital mentor Linda Dement.
Michelle St Anne is a site-responsive choreographic artist whose immersive and intimate performances create unique audience experiences. Her work is deeply symbolic, responding to site-specific architectures, audience movement, and embodied participation through lighting, smell, sound, and temperature shifting the way audiences perceive critical issues of our time. She is the co-founder and artistic director of The Living Room Theatre where she has created, directed, and performed in 26 original works.
Manu Anand is an award-winning Director of Photography who is appreciated for his work in the films Shuddh Desi Romance (2013), Dum Laga Ke Haisha (2015), Fan (2016) and Zero (2018) and the recently released Dhamaka(2021). He is in post-production for Bhool Bhulaiyan 2 (2021). He won the Filmfare award for best Cinematography for Dum Laga Ke Haisha in 2015.
Imogen Cranna is a cross disciplinary artist who graduated from the New Zealand School of Dance in 2007 with a National Diploma in Dance Performance. She returned to Sydney in 2008 and has performed in both her own projects and works of professional choreographers in various independent dance platforms, working with icons such as Kay Armstrong, Tess de Quincey, Vicki Van Hout, and Tony Osborne. She has been a key collaborator of Michelle St Anne’s for ten years.
This project is funded by Create NSW.