Fractillian

happy birthday

“Negative Capability, that is when man is capable of being in uncertainties, Mysteries, doubts without any irritable reaching after fact & reason.” John Keats

“The budget should be balanced, the Treasury should be
refilled, public debt should be reduced, the arrogance of
officialdom should be tempered and controlled, and the
assistance to foreign lands should be curtailed lest Rome
become bankrupt. People must again learn to work, instead
of living on public assistance.” - Cicero - 55 BC

. VCA’s Puppetry course on the chopping block
Ben Eltham writes:
The Victorian College of the Arts faces a deeply uncertain future as Melbourne University makes swinging cuts to courses and jobs there.
Earlier this month Crikey’s Luke Buckmaster reported that jobs were slashed, writing:
In its first month the VCAM have let go at least 12 casual professional staff, moved others to different employee agreements and implemented a hiring freeze. A new announcement in the next fortnight is expected to include further staff and course cuts.
“It’s pretty evident the university is ready to slash and burn,” says Alison Hose of the Victorian College of the Arts Student Union, which permanently closes in June due to a lack of funding. “Staff are extremely concerned and everyone is walking around looking panic stricken about their jobs at the moment.”
And as Robin Usher reported today in The Age, the School of Puppetry will be “suspended” in a plan that will ultimately see the VCA amalgamate the existing six schools into three or even two.
Students are so concerned they have set up a website, on which they have posted a leaked business plan which outlines the university’s intentions to cut 11 million in funding from the VCA and implement the controversial “Melbourne model” course structure:

The Dean of the VCA, Professor Sharman Pretty, is a highly polarising figure who has prior “form” in forced amalgamations of university courses. Her tenure at Auckland University saw her described as a “chainsaw” and led to staff and student protests after the unhappy departure of distinguished Yale architecture Professor Peggy Deamer. Staff and students told Chris Barton at the New Zeland Herald of a “climate of fear”, a “climate of cynicism”, a “climate of asphyxiation” and a “toxic environment”. Before that, professor Pretty was involved in a restructure at the Sydney Conservatorium.
The VCA’s problems stem from its long-term underfunding by the federal Education department. Institutions like the National Institute of Dramatic Arts (NIDA) and the Australian Film Television and Radio School (AFTRS) are funded by Peter Garrett’s Arts portfolio and receive much higher funding levels per student than Education-funded institutions like VCA. Addressing this mismatch in funding levels was a recommendation of Terry Cutler’s Innovation report, Venturous Australia, released last year, but so far Julia Gillard’s Education department has yet to come to the party.
The result of the VCA’s funding problems was a shotgun marriage with Melbourne University in 2007. Under Professor Pretty, the University is now implementing savage cost-cuts to make the newly-named VCA “sustainable,” but it looks very much as much of the unique character of the VCA will be lost in the process.
The Puppetry School, for instance, is the only school of its type in the Southern Hemisphere, and it is not at all clear that demand will exist for expensive post-graduate courses in the new model. After all, even successful VCA graduates often go on to risky and impoverished careers in the performing and fine arts.
As student Alison Hope told The Age, “the fear is that no actor or dancer will be able to pay the post-grad fees. It’s not as if they earn the equivalent of doctors or engineers.”
But Deans of universities do, which is perhaps why the indefatigable Sharman Pretty seems determined to cut and slash her way through the third controversial academic restructure of her career.

Burrows quotes

And the Burrows workshop, some quotes; - The job of the artist is to find out what you are able to do. Not what you want to do. What you are good at doing is too familiar to you so you don’t do it. Or, “ The aspects of things that are most important for us are hidden because of their simplicity “ Wittgenstein. “The crisis of contemporary performance is that all conventions are broken from the beginning” Adrian Heathfield. Or “constant invention becomes predictable”… Burrows. However he also mentioned…”the audience reads meaning when a performer makes a decision.” Lastly, “Don’t be imaginative and don’t try and impose this on others” “Don’t oppress yourself with the need to have vision” Burrows

They once said that a black man would be president when pigs fly.

Obama has been president for 100 days and Swine Flu.

“Sugar is sweet because we like it, not we like sugar because it is sweet.” Dan Dennet, Darwin’s Strange inversion.

Chaos

I enjoy the experience of chaos in the studio when I am working. I also enjoy watching as systems or groups self-organise into a sense of order. As a teacher of dance and improvisation I feel relatively at home and versed in this realm until… yesterday morning and this morning blew my world and understanding away. Admittedly I often explore this area in the comfort of a university or independently run workshop not at a Catholic boys school auditioning Year 4’s (age 9 and 10) for the dance program.

Chaos, total chaos. Was I like that when I was that age? surely not.

“Okay boys have you got the sequence? Step right, step left, skip, skip turn around and cartwheel. Got it? Do you need me to go over it? Okay then let’s go… 5…6…7…8 and…….Why are you doing it?”

“I don’t know what to do”

This is when my brain popped and I realised i dont know chaos I just think I do.

The chaos i understand is quite a polite and mature kinda chaos but not for long. I am about to learn about chaos from a whole new angle….

in my new job as Dance Co-ordinator for Trinity boys college.