HA!News 4 May 2014
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HA!Man press release

Dear all

 

This time, let HA!News be like real news.. An overview of what we recently created and where we performed..

 

On (some of) what we created

 

I put the clock to zero. I write. This, one of us does each month. At the end of an hour, the writing stops. Whatever was said, was said. And as I did recently in the One Hour Non-Stop Spontaneous writing, my words gravitated towards the topic of the end of the world.. “All this could just sound just like another saucy Armageddon scenario, dreamt up by disturbed visionaries (carrying their seeds of truth of course), but this is real life dusty realities looming, just as real as a farmer facing a drought, or Everest climbers fleeing the latest avalanche.” Bam! Disastrous! But I also dug up a series of rainbow-washed photos, taken of youth dancing after a “HA! Workshop” at the Mandela Memorial Centre near Qunu, I slashed a driving music track to it to become the “movie of the month” and the world seems endless again.

 

And it keeps seeming endless when a majestic herd of elephants comes down from a hill in the Addo Elephant Park, a scene that inspired a heart-wrenching harmonic sequence in this piece. Then, uncovering an old arrangement of Händel’s “Largo,” the endlessness deepens.. which makes me want to concur with Joke in one of her poems: ”So today I think / I am going to move from despair to hope / Leaving my old home / Of flowing on my / Clouds of doubts / And questions all around / For a journey / Into an everlasting / Engraving way of unfolding / On this butterfly field / Of our luck.”

 

But then again, reading my own pen, this hits: “seeing one flower die / reading the storms as they intensify / and terribly vague / the bend ahead / and my own arm too weak / to even count seven days ahead..” And my “eyes” (see graphic to the right) grow dark and I threaten to become cynical with Tomas, a character from Joke’s play “the Battle for Joy,” when he says: “(Shall) I be pleased to send some more nonsense into the world? To enlarge the garbage bin of empty letters, right?”

 

Ah OK! Then I will look death straight in the eye.. and am suddenly reminded of how sex is an act that approaches the quality of death. And I took the pen and wrote a whole essay on it, discovering that we do not need to be helpless (nor cynical) in the face of death, or of desire: “in fact, the desire to be aroused / and arousal itself, lie so close together / that the acknowledgement of the desire / opens the arousal..”

 

This ties in with the second essay I wrote about the spiritual journey life took me on, the theme this time, “losing the faith” - which was “accompanied indeed by a deep sense of being lost, of facing a darkness that has always been studiously avoided.” What if the darkness, the end of all, can indeed not be avoided? What if our world is in fact not to last forever? Shall we embrace the paradox that Joke expresses in “From the HA!rt:” “Fall down with your head flat / on the ground / after that / do and feel and reach / for the stars..?” In other words, shall we, paradoxically, find the Endlessness by virtue of the End?

 

Well, in a hope-ful tone, another poem by Joke reminds me that there is no beginning without an end: “To get lost in the cave / And burn our notions of sin / So that any conclusion / Dissolves in the clouds.. / love.. / The beginnings of a world / Unfolding like water..” So ends this overview of our recent creative efforts.

 

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On our performances

 

 

Since the beginning of March, we are happy to share with you that a number of relationships with institutions and communities resulted in (at least) the intention to deepen our creative engagements by means of annual visits. These include spontaneous music workshops at Paul Roos Gymnasium and Bloemhof schools in Stellenbosch as well as Boy’s High in Paarl, “Spontaneous Explosions” with the whole of Cedar House School in Cape Town, Collaborative Improvisation events at Novalis Ubuntu Institute, adult workshops in Hermanus, school arts programmes at the Leysin American School, Switzerland, general workshops with home schoolers in Kent (England), interactive performances with adolescents at the Brookside Adolescent Unit (NHS) in London and finally free-flow expression workshops for all in Dover, in collaboration with DAD.

 

Our hearts are warmed by each visit and each event - many thanks to those involved as mentioned above, as well as Nikki in Stanford, Lynette at Vista Nova School, Patrick in Ashton (actively opening new doors for us in that region), John and Gail in Fish Hoek, Lisa and her charming guest house in Prince Albert, Gavin and family in Johannesburg and Dominic in the lovely English village of Wendens Ambo.

 

Then, I want to make special mention of a three day run we had at the Kalk Bay Theatre, with the supportive Simon and Helen Cooper at the helm. This has been the third HA! appearance there and each time a serious pleasure to enter its intimate space. Also to mention all our poetic friends in Antwerp, starting with Andy Fierens who welcomed me there since 2002 and musician Michael Brijs who this time brought us together for a vibrant Antonin Artaud “indulge-ment.” The evening sprouted another event for June - Antwerpers will be notified! And finally, we were guested generously by Karine Monségu for the third time at Air France head quarters, for a lunch time appearance. Merci beaucoup, Karine!

 

The rest of the Europe tour lie ahead - North Italy, Kadan in the Czech Republic, Berlin, the Netherlands and back in Belgium.

 

·         To view details of these events and make bookings, please go here.

·         To view general touring schedule for the rest of the year, go here.

 

With greetings to you all!

Francois/HA!Man (and Joke)

 

www.hamanworld.com