Project Proposal Details
Title of Work: People as Medicine – A Film and Dance Project.
Project Image: 
Mission Statement: “Performing Science” (see Vision & Q’s)
Project Type: Film (Music Film). Installation/Event, Performance (stage, workshop), Hands-on/audience participatory.
Duration of Project: One-time performance, Portable in time/space.
Brief Outline of research, scientific areas of study: See Annotated Bibliography
Vision for the project: See Vision & Q’s / Home
Desired Audience:
Persons dealing with cancer and other chronic/life-threatening disease, and people connected to them: physicians/providers, family/friends, those who engage in relationships of support or have lost loved ones).
* (Film will call future partners into fold; upcoming workshops, performances in Spring 2012. (Film also serves as representation of ongoing partners, potential work of collaborators, and window in to ongoing research of the intersection of the “science of hope,” performance, and acts of social support which might shift experience and process of serious disease, and life-threatening or chronic illness).
Ethical concerns/considerations:
Precaution should be taken for all participant’s physical abilities and limitations. For participants from Cancer Support Groups, precautions will be taken regarding pain and risk for bodily injury (such as bone density), fatigue and side effects from treatment (such as oral or injected chemotherapy/radiation): all will be invited to choose to dance seated (movements with arms, hands, fingers, or even head and eyes), or standing doing gentle movement (including T’ai Chi facilitated by Pearl Nguyen and/or Shin-yiing Yeung), and all will be reminded throughout the session to check in with the abilities and limitations of their bodies, and first aid will be on premises. Producer and Choreographer Marie Garlock, as well as choreographer Leah Wilks, and appointed dance and community participants will help ensure this is an ongoing process of checking in with the safety of participants. This same precaution and guideline applies for elders, and those who have physical limitations. For those in a smaller group of dancers who elect to dance more continuously, rehearsals will ensure safety.
Several persons versed in counseling and group facilitation (Clergy, Cancer Support Group Facilitators, Nurses and Healing Touch Facilitators) will be present with participants on each night of filming, to respond to any emotional concerns that may arise during the filming process. (Most of the piece will be abstract visual representation; however in production process, Ass’t Dir. Marie Garlock may work with select participants to use poetry and dance phrases they have created from engagement with their own experiences with illness and disease, to either prepare them for or guide the direct nature of their participation).
Physical Requirements:
Location – Powerhouse (and Walker Buildings), at West Village, Duke St., Durham, NC.
Equipment, Electronics Access, Lighting - Hueism Pictures and Production Team
Web interface – TBD (potentially on hueismpictures.com, itisinyou.org, or otherwise).
Participant Needs – Participants will need to be contacted regarding their schedules 1-2 weeks in advance. Emails, texts, and phone calls will be made to solicit contributions in the form of physical participation, suggestions, and thoughts, from potential partners.
Audience Needs – The audience will need access to an online version of the film, screened version of the film, or DVD. Once it is edited, the film can be distributed in any of these formats. It may act as an entry in to either understanding of or participation in ongoing or upcoming research, workshops in 2011 into Spring of 2012 (when workshops/conference are TBD proposed). And beyond. Potentially act as fundraising tool for creative cancer support mechanisms (such as expressive therapy Cancer Support Groups’ activities, Breast Cancer Action Network, advocacy group), and other related work in the realm of performance for health and social change.
Material Conditions – Temperature controlled space (as in Powerhouse 2nd Floor), with bathrooms and emergency exit for participants (Powerhouse Building 2nd Floor, off Duke St. and Fernway). (or relatively temperature-neutral space, also with bathrooms, emergency exit, like Walker Building, off Main St. by Pettigrew.)
Example/prototype:
The song we’ll use: Fever Ray, I’m Not Done
Video Inspirations, Dance Inspirations, Visual Art Inspirations (See Annotated Bibliography)
Anticipated costs for project:
Designers’ time, participants’ time, equipment (Hueism and Design Team), filming space (West Village donation). Follow up editing time (Hueism Pictures, Andrew Synowiez with Habib Yazdi, Editor).
Anticipated venues for funding:
Institute for Arts and Humanities, Innovation Grants, Durham Arts Council Emerging Artist Grants (future)
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Applicant Name: Marie Garlock
Applicant Bio:
Marie Garlock is an interdisciplinary artist focusing in dance, theatre & film, cultural & spiritual storytelling, and health & development education. Based in Durham NC, she’s a first year Masters/Ph.D. student in Communication at UNC-Chapel Hill, training in Performance, and Communication for Health and Social Change. Her spirit is unleashed with the opportunity to try new things, take on new roles, including dancing in Chuck Davis’ Powerful Long Ladderand Vincent Mantsoe’s Sundusa/Shift, acting in stage adaptation ofVertigo as Madeline-Judy, and performing as Zaynab, a young Iraqi woman, in Christine Evans’ new play, You are Dead You Are Here:A Ghost Story for the Digital War Age. Her center of gravity is in interdisciplinary performance, as opportunity for vibrant bodies to be in motion together, and to gather in co-produced insight. She’s thankful to offer “Reclaiming Your Body” movement workshops with C.K. Lee for Cancer Support Groups, consult with the UNC Center for AIDS Research, and participate in community development projects with partners like WomenNC, The “Diverse 30” for Wake County Schools, and the Triangle Dance Festival for AIDS with Baba Chuck Davis of the African American Dance Ensemble. For the past few years she’s had the surprise of touring in artistic residencies to schools and conferences with a cross-cultural performance of oral histories, “It is In You,” as inspired by the wisdom of friends, mentors, and health organizers from Tanzania in East Africa. She believes people from divergent body, social, and political histories should be included in art. She believes art is a process to bring both witness and healing, as it gives the chance to see in-and-out (and upside down), and to speak up, to and for ourselves, in the remarkable gift of risk and imagination.
Bios of Collaborating Artists:
Andrew Synowiez:
http://hueismpictures.com/about/
Hi, I’m Andrew Synowiez, a creative photographer in Durham, NC. I’m interested in all facets of photography and strive for diversity in my work, which is published nationally in Scientific American, USA Today, Sports Illustrated, and the LA Times. http://synster.com