‘What the money meant’ and the materiality of dollars

In this presentation, I will discuss my recent practice-based scenographic investigation and performance 'What The Money Meant', shown at SITE 1/SAFLE 1 Festival at Aberystwyth Arts Centre (Wales) and Chelsea Theatre (London). 'What The Money Meant' is described as a Brechtian musical for three people and a spectacle for more. Using images, diagrams and video documentation, I will explore the ways in which this piece's explicit use of financial transactions might shed light on the power of money as an object of action in performance. I will also consider the ways in which the imbrication of money-objects in performance might expose tensions that are fundamental to the current capitalist moment, in which affective labour's immateriality is constantly juxtaposed with the calcification of this labour into objects. I am particularly interested in dialogue around the use of tipping as a vehicle for audience participation (borrowing the model of participation often found in strip shows or street performance). Tipping is a means of communication between humans. However, in the moment that money changes hands, the money-object takes on a significance that is separate from the humans around it. How might this fetishistic process be used to a performance's advantage? I will close the presentation by considering how this specific discussion might shed light on potential ways in which other objects might be situated dramaturgically in order to produce specific affects, with reference to my upcoming practice-as-research enquiry The Ballad of Isosceles. The presentation is an opportunity to present my doctoral and post-doctoral research at an internationally recognized conference/c olloquium, which reflects well on the Performance Research Group. Presenting on this past project will also assist in articulating and developing questions around my new practice-as-research piece, The Ballad of Isosceles, for which I was recently granted a Vice Chancellor’s Early Career Researcher Scholarship (which will begin in August 2015)