"Original, inspired and fantastically talented" Total Theatre
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"F’ing excellent, Like watching Nureyev and the Divine David on mushrooms! Book now, like NOW" G Scene
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"Cultured magpies" Exeunt Magazine
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"I love it... I’m literally craning my neck to get closer to the stage" British Theatre Guide
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"A subversive delight" ***** The Stage
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"No-one makes work anything like this" - BachTrack
AN EFFORT IN CAMP
In 18 Attempts​
Part of
Third Year Graduation Works
London Contemporary Dance School
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Created during the Covid 19 lockdown
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Thick & Tight have had the pleasure of working with fourteen fabulous students and together we've plunged into five weeks of research, experiments, reading and recording. Unable to be in the studio, we had to reassess our way of working; rather than coming in with set ideas, choreography, score etc. as we usually would, we decided to lead the students through a series of creative and research exercises so they could understand how we begin making work, before we even step into a studio. It has been wonderful to be able to share our work in this way and to learn from this new generation of dance artists.
Our work is often labelled as ‘camp’ and for a while we have wanted to understand the meaning of the word a little better. We devised a sort of ‘Course in Camp’ which has culminated in a film; an ode to all the wonderful work the students have produced and all the works we have studied.
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Design by Tim Spooner
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Polari Sound Recordings by Thom Shaw
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Music by​ Warren/Brown/Free/Deutsch, Olivier Messiaen, Nino Rota, Shim Sang-gun, Stefan Prins, The Tornados, NASA Voyager Space Craft, Richard Strauss, Gina X Performance, Barbra Streisand, Sol Kaplan, Brian Eno, Neu!, Sohail Rana, Leroy Anderson
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STARRING​
Verity Wright
Elyssa Sena
Angelina Gorgaeva
Zakarius Harry
Milo Aylward
Annabelle Peach
Giorgina Pini
Evie Jackson
Thea Kallhed Gadefors-Möller
Tania Chua Wei Ning
James Healy
Margherita Giuliodori
Jessica Van de Koot
Freya Lawson
REFERENCES & RESEARCH
FOOTAGE/SOUND USED IN
AN EFFORT IN CAMP
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Quentin Crisp Interview
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Royal Vauxhall Tavern in the 1960s
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June Jordan poems
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Death on The Nile
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Rebecca
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The Wizard of Oz
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Saint Joan
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Whoopi Goldberg
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Eastenders
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From Russia With Love
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Carmen Amaya
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Disney's Alice In Wonderland
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Nicola Adams
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Sunset Boulevard 1950
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Supermarket Sweep
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Marilyn Monroe in Niagara
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Andy Warhol Screen Tests
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Bernstein on Mahler
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FURTHER REFERENCES AND RESEARCH
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Butch Camp Instagram
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Paris Is Burning
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The Importance of Being Earnest
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Tod Papageorge
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Ivor Cutler
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In Search of the Great English Eccentric
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The Evolution of Stop Motion Animation
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Samuel Fosso
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Claude Cahun
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I Love Lucy
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Divine David
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LIST OF TEXTS STUDIED IN THICK & TIGHT'S
'COURSE IN CAMP'
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Notes on Camp, Susan Sontag 1964
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Notes on Camp/Anti Camp, Bruce LaBruce 2013
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Notes on Dyke Camp, Mikaella Clements 2018
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"The Booty Don't Lie" and Other Camp Truths in the Performances of Janelle Monae, Francesca T. Royster, in 'Music & Camp' edited by Christopher Moore & Philip Purvis 2018
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Disneyworld Company in 'Screened Out', Jean Baudrillard 2002 (p.150-154)
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Dream Kitsch, Walter Benjamin 1925
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From Interiority to Gender Performatives in 'Gender Trouble', Judith Butler 1990, in 'Camp: Queer Aesthetics & The Performing Subject – A Reader' edited by Fabio Cleto 1999
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Watch My Lips: The Limits of Camp in Lip-Syncing Scenes, Freya Jarman 2017, in 'Music & Camp' edited by Christopher Moore & Philip Purvis 2018
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A Brief History of Polari, Paul Baker 2017
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Introduction: Low Theory, in 'The Queer Art of Failure' by Judith Halberstam 2011
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The Jewel in the Gutter; Camp and the Incorporation of Dirt, Ingrid Hotz-Davies, in 'The Dark Side of Camp Aesthetics: Queer Economies of Dirt, Dust and Patina', 2018, edited by Ingrid Hotz-Davies, Franziska Bergmann, Georg Vogt
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Slave Chains and Faggots and Camp... Oh My!, Noah Fields 2015
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Age, Race, Class & Sex, in 'Sister Outsider', Audre Lorde 1984
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Bodies That Matter Introduction, Judith Butler 1993
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On Queer of Color Criticism, Communication Studies, and Corporeality, Jesus I. Valles-Morales and Benny LeMaster 2015
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'A Stoat Came To Tea: Camp Poetics & Masculinity, Antony Rowland 2010
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FURTHER READING:
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Music & Camp, edited by Christopher Moore & Philip Purvis 2018
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Camp: Queer Aesthetics & The Performing Subject – A Reader, edited by Fabio Cleto 1999
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Guilty Pleasures: Feminist Camp from Mae West to Madonna, Pamela Robertson 1996
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Queer Voices from Japan: First Person Narratives from Japan's Sexual Minorities, edited by Suganuma, Welker & McLelland 2007
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English Eccentrics, Edith Sitwell 1933
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Powers of Horror: An Essay on Abjection, Julia Kristeva 1982
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CAMP QUESTIONNAIRE
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• What is the campest object in your room? Why?
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• Which colour is the campest of them all. Be specific in hue and reasoning.
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• What is the campest drink you could order at a bar/pub?
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• What is the campest speed to move at?
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• List all the ways that makes this track camp… https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q6sJL_kuLdM
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• List all the ways that makes this track non camp… https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hKtP8GMM7Bg
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• What is the campest track you know?
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• Historically who is the campest dictator/villain and why?
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• Give an example of a perfect camp one-liner…
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• Which animal makes the campest noise? Explain yourself with an example of the sound on You Tube
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• What is the campest decade of the 20th Century? Why?
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• What is the campest part of your body?
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• What is the campest fruit? And Vegetable?
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• Who is the campest Queen?
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• Who has absolutely no camp sensibilities?
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• What is the campest plant?
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• Who is camp but doesn’t know it?
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• What is the campest building existing or destroyed?
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• What is the campest accessory you can adorn?
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• What is the campest letter in the alphabet?
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• What is the campest word in the dictionary?
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• Which camp-idol do you most identify with?