Sheltering in Llandudno

My time in Llandudno was certainly jam packed, 5 very productive days was had and 5 lovely evening meals at Osbournes, despite my favourite table only being available twice due to the extra visitors drawn by the Victorian extravaganza… how very dare they!

The highpoint of the trip was having Margot Catlin back on board for Cai Tomos’ A solo for Margot  which was terrific news as her charismatic presence was obviously key. We can now create the powerful homage to her early memory of dancing that we originally intended, an event that will take place on the exact site of Margot’s former dancing haunt! With renewed vigour Cai and I launched our selves into a short sharp rehearsal at Venue Cymru and worked out the basic structure for the solo which he will continue to develop until we next meet in the Big Smoke mid June at Siobhan Davies studios. A beautiful space I gather, so a perfect setting for the final rehearsal before transferring it to the intimate setting of the plane interior located on Margot’s memory patch on the prom.

Close to that location in one of the iconic shelters Carwyn Evans set up residency for the whole duration to capture Llandudno residents/visitors in contemplative stances staring out to sea as part of his dual installation Cysgod. There were some excellent contributors (including our great B&B hosts Mike and Steve and dog Rolo, pictured, with only one in participant in Victorian garb) and we were very fortunate to have the very able assistance of Antonia Dewhurst who also documented the project brilliantly.

It was great to catch up with Wendy Couling at CASC studios (which has a lovely new gallery space) and her Trails of Thread project which has inspired her to focus more on her own practis which is terrific. Re-met the Ty Hapus Perl Knitters who had made the plane and stewardesses for the Adain Avion animation film which I was fortunate to see the very first few stills with the plane taking off.

Also saw the Ty Hapus Electric Dance Crew, made up of a bunch of very enthusiastic  7-10 year olds who were pulling some mean urban moves to Motörhead’s The Ace of Spades ‘, which takes me to the uber dynamic Nick Elphick and his studio were his bust of Lemmy which will be integrated to the planes interior for a special installation during the nesting week is coming along magnificently… a small job compared to his last  commission of Olympic proportions!

Much of the last 2 days was spent parading the promenade with Kylie Ann Smith (of Kitch & Synch Collective ) who will be chief purser for the AAA troupe (Adain Avion Attendants) our very own homage to Will Catlin (Margot’s dad), who invented a pioneering marketing technique to publicise his Theatre by engaging groups of Pierrots and strategically positioning them about the town, the AAA Troupe will create tableaux around familiar landmarks with added micro choreographies inspired by the in-flight routines of air stewardesses.We selected suitable sites for the retro style poses, (which will subtly reference the iconic work of Vanessa Beercroft ) and created a trail for the troupe that will take in the Coach park, The Train Station, Mostyn, The Pier, The Prom, The Band Stand and of course the Plane, lasting around 1hr 45mins the troupe will animate the town twice a day for the whole nesting week and will sure add some extra glamour to the rather sedate but special sea side resort… Look out Llandudno here we come!