Last time we caught up with world-renowned choreographer Jasmin Vardimon and her company, it was back in the autumn to discuss the Company’s showing of the re-working of PARK at Sadler’s Wells.

This time Run Riot catches up with Jasmin and Turner Contemporary director Victoria Pomery in an entirely different setting, within the unique location of Margate’s Caves, in the Winter Gardens of Turner Contemporary to discuss Maze.

Maze an immersive new performance presented by two of the UK’s leading arts organisations Turner Contemporary and Jasmin Vardimon Company. It offers audiences a truly unique dance and visual arts experience, moving through a labyrinth, with shifts and surprises that play on the audience’s senses.

‘Audiences will be asked to leave their inhibitions behind and immerse themselves in the unknown. They will choose the ‘light’ or ‘dark’ path and enter Maze, to experience an intimate adventure.’

We wanted to know how this project came about, what challenges they faced and what audiences can expect from this fantastic collaboration - their most ambitious project to date.

Run Riot: Hello Jasmin, how did this collaboration happen?
Jasmin Vardimon: We were excited about the prospect of a project where both of our worlds met.

As both organisations are based in Kent, we're both keen to develop the art and audiences in our region and the opportunity came up with the Arts Council England Exceptional Award which was awarded to us to bring this unique collaborative project to life.

RR: Working across both visual arts and dance, what new challenges came about through the creation of this ambitious project?
Jasmin: Space was the first challenge for the project. A dance performance within an art installation where audience immerse themselves require very large space and luckily we found the Winter Gardens with its unique location.   
 
RR: Could you tell us about the premise of Maze and how you developed the concept for the project?
Jasmin: I’m always interested in new challenges, new ways of communicating ideas and creating experiences.

I was interested in exploring perspective, and how it can change the information we receive as an individual viewer. I also wanted to create a project that explored details as information on the performer's skin.

For a long time I was inspired by the 1930 film by Jean Cocteau 'Blood of a Poet’. I was always intrigued by the journey of its main character and his unique and very personal perspective, looking through a peep hole into a new unexpected world.

I was interested in putting the audience in the position when a member can choose where to look but the reality keeps changing so each individual perceives a different reality dependent on the time and location and path they chose.

On meeting with Turner Contemporary we explored the notion of risk (as a concept in their upcoming exhibition). I found risk a very important ingredient, which I was very curious to explore as part of this project. Slowly Maze emerged.
 
RR: What was it like creating work within the setting of Margate’s caves, within the Winter Gardens?
Jasmin: Well, Maze was created in my company's production space in Ashford, with the unique Winter Garden location in mind. We're really looking forward to building the complete Maze there.

RR: Do you have any expectations or desires on the kind of experiences that audiences might have? If so, how might these experiences differ to other works that you have created?
Jasmin: An intimate and multi sensory experience as they will be able to physically explore the texture and architecture, to see, hear, smell and sense the experience at very close proximity.

Each one of the 30 audience members will have their own individual and personal experience with the performers, depending on what path or risk they choose to take or simply where they choose to look.

The experience the audience would have is as close as it can get to being on stage with the company’s dancers.

RR: From working on this project has it opened up your company to new ideas or opportunities, which you might take forward?
Jasmin: For an artist to work out of their own comfort zone is the most exciting thing. Personally I’m always very curious about collaborating with new art forms, and over the years I have worked with many different artists - but the outcome was always for a production that exists behind the proscenium arch.

This project brought the challenge / opportunity to create a 360 degree viewing possibility. You can see the actions through holes / cracks, from under/ above, from few centimeters / meters. Every perspective provides a different experience, which is something I’m keen to carry on and investigate further in the future.

Victoria Pomery, Director of Turner Contemporary

RR: Hi Victoria, as Director of Turner Contemporary, how did you approach this project and how did you find the process of curating this work compared with other exhibitions?
Victoria Pomery: We have approached this project in much the same way that we would work with a visual artist to create a new work by trusting and supporting them to create the work, inputting at key moments, and taking a key role in mediating how audiences engage with the work and the communication of the project. Jasmin’s process has involved viewings of the performance as the piece has been developed, which has enabled us to maintain a good dialogue throughout its development.     
 
RR: What most excites you about this project and the collaboration with Jasmin Vardimon Company?
Victoria: This project - combining dance and visual art - enables new and exciting experiences and forms of engagement for audiences at Turner Contemporary and JVC. Through working in partnership, we are able to achieve an ambitious project which enables both organisations to experiment and innovate beyond what we could achieve independently.

RR: Has this project and its process made you consider new ways of approaching future collaborations and exhibitions at Turner Contemporary?
Victoria: Being involved in the development of a dance performance piece of this scale has enabled us to learn a lot about how dance companies develop new works. This will impact on future programming, the first instance our upcoming Risk exhibition which opens in autumn 2015. Although we have worked with choreographers and dancers in the past, this major cross-art form project and a longer term collaboration with Jasmin Vardimon Company represents a way of working which we definitely want to build on through continued collaboration with JVC and by touring Maze.  

RR: An element of the Maze installation will also feature in Turner Contemporary’s upcoming Risk exhibition. Could you tell us what audiences might expect and experience?
Victoria: It will probably involve both a sculptural and performance element. Our thinking about exactly what it might be is evolving as Maze is being developed. This is part of what makes this collaboration so exciting.

Maze: Immerse yourself in the unknown...
11 April – 15 April 2015
Winter Gardens, Margate


maze-event.org  

Photo credit: Ben Harries